The  Old  Rome  and  the  New 

AND 

Other  Studies 


BY 


W.   J.    STILLMAN 

AUTHOR   OF    "ON    THE   TRACK    OF   ULYSSES,"    "EARLY   ITALIAN- 
PAINTERS,"  ETC. 


BOSTON    AND   NEW   YORK 

HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN   AND   COMPANY 

Cbe  iRiverst&e  ipress,  Cambridge 

1898 


PS 


To 

Professor  CHARLES  ELIOT  NORTON  of  Harvard 
University,  sole  survivor  of  that  luminous  circle  in 
which  once  shone  Lowell,  Longfellow,  Emerson, 
Holmes,  Agassis,  etc.— -circle  to  whose  intellectual 
hospitality  I  owe  my  imprimatur  for  American 
letters — this  Volume  is  affectionately  dedicated,  in 
memory  of  our  forty  years  of  fraternal  relation 
and  sympathy. 

THE  AUTHOR 


644356 


PREFACE 

The  papers  comprised  in  this  volume  have  been 
printed  in  various  magazines  and  reviews  in 
England  and  America  during  the  years  between 
1867  (My  Experience  in  a  Greek  Quarantine)  to 
1895  (The  Old  Rome  and  the  New),  the  only  earlier 
paper  being  " The  Subjective  of  It"  the  date  of 
which  I  cannot  recall,  nearer  than  to  say  that  it 
was  one  o/%  the  first  contributions  I  made  to  the 
Atlantic,  when  Lowell  was  the  Editor,  and  its 
articles  were  printed  anonymously.  They  are 
selections  from  the  wreckage  of  a  life  which  has 
reached  the  limits  beyond  which  it  cannot  be  said 
that  there  is  no  hope,  but  at  which  reasonable  men 
should  be  resigned  if  there  should  be  none,  and 
at  which  the  highest  good  seems  tranquillity,  and 
the  highest  wisdom  resignation.  Of  that  life  in 
its  entirety,  not  uninteresting  in  adventure,  and 
marked  by  some  strange  experiences  in  men  and 
things,  I  hope  shortly  to  tell  the  story.  The  most 
of  what  I  have  written  during  it  is  well  lost,  un 
signed  in  pages  of  periodicals  from  which  I  have 
no  desire  to  hunt  it  out.  But  the  natural  and 
harmless  vanity  of  a  man  who  has  earned  his 
bread  by  literature  is  to  hope  that  something  may 
survive  him,  which  shall  serve  to  keep  him  alive, 
at  least  in  the  memory  of  his  descendants  and 


PREFACE 

those  of  the  friends  who  walked  the  same  road 
with  him,  at  the  same  time.  And  with  this  let 
us  be  content — few,  indeed,  are  they  whose  writing 
survives  their  epoch,  and  in  the  multitudinous  drift 
of  humanity  into  oblivion,  let  us  console  ourselves 
that  we  are  always  in  the  enormous  majority. 

Beginning,  as  most  young  writers  do,  with  more 
ambition  than  sound  knowledge  of  my  competence, 
I  had  the  good  fortune  to  learn  soon  that  the 
opinions  of  young  men  are  rarely  worth  preserving, 
though  their  art  may  be  so,  and  I  then  decided 
that  I  would  publish  nothing  before  I  should  be 
forty:  when  I  was  forty  I  postponed  to  fifty:  at 
fifty  I  said,  sixty  is  not  too  late:  and  at  sixty  I 
had  still  too  much  to  learn  and  I  would  trust  to 
seventy.  And  now,  at  seventy,  I  would  fain  wait 
a  little  longer,  were  eighty  assured,  feeling  my 
incompetence  more  keenly  than  even  at  thirty. 
Partial  infractions  of  such  a  resolution  could  not 
be  avoided  by  a  man  who  had  only  his  pen  in 
place  of  a  fortune,  but  I  can  honestly  say  that  of 
my  own  ambition  I  have  sent  out  nothing  between 
book-covers  except  from  a  sense  of  the  obligation 
to  make  known  things  which  I  thought  the  world 
ought  to  know,  like  the  history  of  the  Cretan  in 
surrection  of  1866,  and  the  heroic  revolt  of  the 
Slavs  of  Herzegovina  in  1876.  But  I  have  been 
true  to  my  principles  in  that,  though  xvhat  I  wrote 
in  my  immaturer  state  is  now  put  forth  in  a  book, 
I  have  revised  and  re-considered  what  I  then  wrote, 
and  am  prepared  to  stand  or  fall  in  the  opinion 
of  my  critics  by  what  is  printed.  Whatever  there 


PREFACE 

is  of  narration  in  the  following  pages  is  fact,  even 
to  the  curious  experience  recorded  in  "  The  Subjec 
tive  of  It"  with  the  exception  of  an  unimportant 
detail  in  the  Quarantine  story,  which  as  a  whole  is 
a  re-arrangement  of  actual  incidents,  but  drawn 
from  two  distinct  experiences;  but  where  they  are 
the  expression  of  opinions  I  hold  them  with  a 
deference  for  that  collective  wisdom  which  finally 
prevails  over  all  error.  I  belong  to  my  epoch  and 
do  not  pretend  to  be  wiser  than  it;  and  if  in 
relation  to  Art  I  hold  my  opinions  strongly,  it  is 
because  I  have  done  my  best  during  fifty  years  to 
fit  myself  by  the  study  of  all  early  and  great  Art 
to  form  them.  If  in  the  two  Art  studies  there 
are  repetitions,  this  was  hardly  to  be  avoided  in 
two  papers  written  with  a  long  interval  for  differ 
ent  periodicals  on  the  same  theme.  The  same  idea 
appears  in  different  relations,  and  to  condense  the 
two  into  a  single  article  I  found  impossible.  Let 
me  hope  that  repetitio  juvat. 

Milford,  Surrey,  1897. 


CONTENTS 

EMI 

THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW        ...  1 

MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS         ...  25 

MY  EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE             .  40 

AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON      .           .  63 

JOHN  RUSKIN           .....  92 

A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          .           .           .  128 
THE  DECAY  OF  ART             .           .           .           .168 

THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART          .           .           .           .  198 

THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  .  .  .  .  232 

THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  265 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

THERE  is  something  in  the  fascination  of  Rome 
that  escapes  my  power  of  analysis.  A  genera 
tion  has  passed,  and  a  second  is  on  its  way,  since 
I  first  came  under  its  witchery;  everything  is 
changed  in  it  that  can  be  changed  in  a  city; 
what  can  be  done  to  break  the  antique  charm 
has  been  done,  as  if  in  malice — mutilation,  reno 
vation,  desecration:  and  still  it  keeps  the  charm, 
like  a  masterpiece  of  Greek  sculpture  which  has 
gone  through  the  hands  of  barbarians,  and  come 
out  shattered,  maimed,  and  so  defaced  that  only 
the  eye  of  an  artist  can  see  what  the  artist 
meant  by  it.  It  is  not  its  history  nor  its  topo 
graphy,  neither  its  architecture  nor  its  art,  that 
makes  it  what  it  is :  something  of  all  these, 
perhaps,  but  beyond  these  something  that  defies 
definition — a  kind  of  spiritual  polarity  which 
made  it  from  the  beginning  the  point  to  which 
turned  whatever  there  was  of  aspiration  in  the 
Old  World,  and,  long  before  the  first  wall  was 
built  on  either  Aventine  or  Palatine,  determined 
its  history  fatally ;  and  that,  time  after  time, 
when  an  enemy  had  broken  its  strength  and 
subjected  its  people,  brought  the  remnant  back 
to  renew  the  struggle  against  time,  and  make 
the  declaration  of  eternity,  "  Urbs  Eterna"  It 

A 


2     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

is  not  by  many  the  oldest  imperial  site,  and  it 
has  absorbed  cities  centuries  older  than  itself, 
and  which  were  probably  such  when  the  Ager 
Romanus  was  being  formed  by  the  eruptions  of 
the  Alban  volcanoes.  For  Rome  is  built  on  some 
of  the  newest  land  on  the  earth,  and  Father 
Tiber  once  found  the  sea  at  the  northern  edge  of 
the  plain.  The  wandering  tribes  of  Latin  shep 
herds,  who  built  their  huts  on  the  Aventine, 
probably  came  down  from  their  Sabine  hills  as 
soon  as  the  cinders  turned  to  soil,  and  goats  found 
browsing  and  sheep  grazing;  and  ever  since  men 
have  obeyed  this  unique  attraction. 

In  Hellas  humanity  found  the  expression  of  the 
virtues  and  qualities,  weak  and  strong,  of  its 
youth :  art,  poetry,  the  perception  of  the  beautiful, 
the  first  maturing  of  philosophic  intuition,  the 
harmony  and  the  inspiration  of  a  happy,  healthy, 
intellectual  life,  over  which  no  shadow  of  oppres 
sion,  spiritual  or  political,  had  come — the  perfect 
perception  of  the  beautiful  and  the  ideal  which  is 
the  visible  form  of  the  spiritually  true;  and  with 
these  defects  of  youth,  that  precocious  humanity 
which  was  never  to  become  manhood,  but  which 
would  never  again  be  rivalled  as  youth.  In  Rome 
humanity  "  came  of  age,"  as  we  say  of  the 
youth  of  twenty-one;  judgment  and  power  and 
common  sense,  the  strong  hand  of  empery,  the 
fixed  determination  of  him  who  has  found  his 
vocation, — namely,  to  rule  the  world, — came  to  it. 
Here  the  civic  virtues  set  up  their  school ;  heroism 
of  the  sterner  vein,  law,  which  brought  the 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     3 

sacrifice  of  the  impulse  to  principle,  and  the 
individual  to  the  state,  and  so  evolved  civilisation 
and  empire.  What  the  Greek  was  in  his  bloom- 
time  he  remains,  less  the  virtues  which  belong 
to  youth,  plus  the  vices  of  decay.  So  the  Roman 
ran  through  the  flush  of  manhood  to  its  decline; 
youth  he  never  had,  and  a  serene  and  sublime  old 
age  he  did  not  reach,  but  the  manhood  was  long 
and  tenacious,  dying  finally  by  the  vices  of  man 
hood  as  the  Greek  by  the  vices  of  youth,  yet 
dying  hard  and  late.  It  was  as  if  the  Roman 
character  were  exhaled  from  the  soil,  and  possessed 
from  birth  a  dogged  vitality  like  that  of  some  of 
the  lower  organisms,  foreign  to  all  ideal  beyond 
that  of  the  Civis  Romanus ;  producing  at  no  epoch 
the  finer  fruits  of  the  human  nature ;  borrowing 
its  religion  from  Etruria,  Greece,  Egypt,  Jerusalem, 
or  Constantinople,  its  art  from  Athens  or  Tuscany ; 
no  great  original  artist*  ever  to  this  day  coming 
to  the  surface  from  the  depths  of  that  state- 
incrusted  existence.  All  that  was  finest  the 
Roman  had  to  borrow,  but  he  borrowed  it  as  he 
learned  to  use  it.  Only  one  thing  Rome  created 
for  humanity  as  Greece  had  created  art— the 
organisation  of  the  res  publica  and  law,  which  is 
its  logarithm. 

But  why  Rome  should  have  fallen  where  it  did 
is  to  me  inexplicable.  Climb  the  Capitol  tower, 
and  you  see  below  you  a  group  of  insignificant 

*  With  the  sole  exception,  so  far  as  I  know,  of  Giovanni  Costa,  the 
living  landscape  painter,  one  of  the  type  of  Th.  Rousseau,  whom  he 
resembles  more  than  any  other. 


4     THE  OLD  EOME  AND  THE  NEW 

elevations  in  the  midst  of  a  wide  plain,  bounded 
on  two  sides  by  ranges  of  limestone  hills,  the 
nurseries  of  the  Volscian,  Hernican,  Sabine,  Um- 
brian,  and  Etruscan  powers;  and  on  the  other 
two  the  plain  melts  into  the  sea,  some  fifteen 
miles  away.  It  is  neither  a  sea  site  nor  a  hill 
site,  this  group  of  little  hillocks,  which  the  ancients 
called  their  seven  monies  and  we  call  the  "seven 
hills."  Nor,  puzzling  my  brains  for  years,  have  I 
ever  been  able  to  understand  why,  from  physical 
causes,  Rome  should  have  been  Rome,  and  Athens 
only  Athens.  I  used  to  think,  when  reading  the 
.rfEneid  at  school,  that  jEneas  was  a  fiction  of 
Roman  vanity,  envious  of  the  demigod  founders 
of  other  states;  but,  divested  of  some  of  the 
purely  mythological  elements,  the  Trojan  migra 
tion  to  Latium  is  shown,  by  the  most  recent 
archaeological  discoveries,  to  have  some  foundation 
in  fact.  To  get  at  it,  however,  we  must  first 
understand  that  the  Trojans  were  a  race  of  the 
same  stock  as  the  Greeks,  and  that  the  feud 
which  ended  in  a  struggle  that  is  known,  or 
symbolised,  as  the  siege  of  Troy,  was  really  the 
first  recorded  of  the  rivalries  by  which  the  Greeks 
committed  racial  suicide,  not  a  war  between  Asia 
and  Europe.  The  more  I  study  the  evidences  of 
authenticity  in  the  ancient  traditions,  even  those 
which  are  so  mingled  with  theistic  mythology 
that  we  have  generally  considered  them  as  in 
explicable  fable,  the  more  I  am  convinced  that 
usually  these  traditions  contain  a  solid  basis  of 
historical  fact.  Through  the  series  relating  to 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     5 

the  Greek  and  Italian  civilisations  there  runs  a 
thread  indicating  an  extremely  early  community, 
and  that  the  movement  began  in  Italy  and  went 
eastward  to  Asia  Minor,  returning  later  through 
Greece  to  Italy.  Of  this  movement,  known  in  all 
the  early  traditions  as  Pelasgic,  the  Greek  and 
Trojan  agglomerations  were  final  and  contem 
porary  results.  Amongst  the  traditions  bearing 
directly  on  the  Pelasgic  origin  of  Troy  is  one 
recorded  by  Virgil,  who  says  that  Dardanus  came 
from  Italy.  He  is  supposed  to  have  gone  from 
Cortona,  which  was  the  stronghold  and  latest 
refuge  of  the  Pelasgi,  so  far  as  we  know,  and  we 
have  the  tradition  of  the  building  of  the  first 
walls  of  Troy  by  Hercules  and  Neptune,  who  were 
distinctly  Pelasgic  gods,  of  the  stock  of  Saturn, 
whose  realm  was  Italy.  The  worship  of  Athena, 
the  patroness  of  Troy,  and  the  protection  offered 
by  Juno,  the  patroness  of  the  Argives,  the  heirs 
and  descendants  of  the  wall-building  Pelasgi  in 
the  Peloponnesus,  a  protection  so  warm  as  to 
cool  her  friendship  for  the  Argives  themselves, 
are  further  arguments  for  the  identity  of  the 
races;  and  the  subsequent  migrations  of  Trojans 
and  Greeks  together  to  Italy  and  Sicily  bring  us 
almost  to  historical  tradition.  Segestse  was  settled 
by  a  band  of  Greeks  with  a  Trojan  leader,  and 
the  earliest  traditions  of  Trojan  movements 
mention  the  presence  of  Greeks.  Virgil  represents 
the  settlement  in  the  Tiber  region  of  -ZEneas  and 
his  clan,  while  we  have  the  corresponding  tradi 
tion  that  Falerii  was  founded  by  a  colony  from 


6     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

Argos,  who  built  there  a  copy  of  the  great  temple 
of  Hera  in  the  Argolid.  The  recent  excavations 
on  the  site  of  that  city  show  that,  though  for 
centuries  considered  Etruscan,  and  really  included 
in  the  so-called  Etruscan  league  against  Rome, 
Falerii  was  never  Etruscan,  but  for  centuries 
preserved  its  Greek  character,  becoming  Italicised 
only  shortly  before  the  period  of  the  great  Roman 
movement  northward,  not  far  from  the  time 
when  Veii  came  under  the  rule  of  Rome. 

The  systematic  excavations  being  made  in  the 
country  about  Rome  have  had  for  one  surprising 
result,  besides  showing  that  the  Greek  individuality 
of  Falerii  was  preserved  till  the  Roman  conquest, 
the  indication  that  the  influence  of  the  Greek 
colonisation  of  that  city,  or  something  accom 
panying  it,  extended  over  the  entire  region, 
traces  of  the  same  arts  being  found  at  Antemnae, 
Lanuvium,  Alatri,  and  Veii.  This  does  not  apply 
to  the  ordinary  art  of  Etruria,  which  was  derived 
from  the  Greek,  but  took  on  a  colour  of  Etruscan 
temperament  in  its  development ;  for  this  Faliscan 
art  is  quite  distinct  in  all  its  forms  from  anything 
Etruscan,  and  it  maintains  its  type  to  the  period 
just  prior  to  the  Roman  dominion.  The  objects 
found  in  the  Faliscan  excavations,  now  in  the  new 
Roman  museum  of  the  Villa  Julia,  give  us  the 
history  of  that  city  from  the  earliest  period  of 
Italic  civilisation  to  the  destruction  by  the  Romans. 
The  first  pages  of  this  record  tell  the  universal 
story  of  the  Italic  tribes  from  the  shores  of  the 
Basilicata  to  the  Apennines — a  common  civilisation 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     7 

extending  back  to  an  epoch  of  immense  antiquity, 
which  the  students  of  it  think  they  can  carry 
back  beyond  fifteen  centuries  B.C.  It  is  probable 
that  this  was  a  composite  race  in  which  the 
Siculi,  the  Umbri,  and  the  Pelasgi  were  the  prin 
cipal  elements,  the  last  dominating  until  merged 
in  the  Italic.  The  distinctive  Greek  contributions 
in  the  stratification  of  the  deposits  begin  not 
later  than  the  eighth  century  B.C.,  Attic  pottery 
being  found  in  the  tombs,  but  of  an  extremely 
archaic  type;  and  the  evidence  grows  stronger 
till  the  sixth  century,  when  the  ceramics  are  very 
largely  of  well-known  Attic  types,  and,  though 
always  accompanied  by  home-made  ware  of  a 
rude  character,  finally  reach  the  highest  attain 
ment  of  Greek  production.  The  tombs  also  give 
evidence  of  great  riches  and  intimate  commerce 
with  Greece,  vases  being  found  bearing  names  of 
Attic  painters.  During  the  sixth  and  fifth  cen 
turies  the  Attic  influence  is  supreme;  with  the 
fourth  a  change  takes  place,  and  the  imported 
work  appears  no  longer,  but  in  its  place  a  Faliscan 
art,  which  is  in  some  cases  of  extreme  beauty, 
though  it  is  the  beauty  of  the  decline  of  art, 
which  continues  till  the  time  of  the  destruction. 
The  fragments  of  the  statuary  found  in  the 
temples  are  of  a  pure  Greek  art,  and  though  of 
terra  cotta  they  are  as  fine  as  anything  of  the 
fourth  and  third  centuries  discovered  in  Greece. 
The  inscriptions  which  appear  in  the  fourth 
century  are  in  Latin,  archaic  but  distinctly  Latin, 
and  one  vase,  which  is  an  excellent  copy  of  Greek 


8     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

work,  bears  the  names  of  the  Olympian  deities 
in  the  Greek  characters  of  the  time,  but  in  Latin — 
"Minerva"  for  "Athena,"  "Cupido"  for  "Eros,"  and 
"Zeus  Pater"  for  "Zeus."  The  Latinisation  has 
become  complete.  The  beginning  of  this  change, 
and  the  severance  from  Greece  and  the  loss  of 
Greek  commerce  must  have  taken  place  about 
a  century  before  the  time  of  the  capture  of  Veii 
and  Falerii  by  the  Romans. 

The  slight  researches  in  the  Ager  Veientinus 
have  given  similar  objects;  and  as  we  know  that 
the  patroness  of  Veii  was  Juno,  shown  by  the 
legend  of  the  taking  of  the  city  and  the  removal 
of  the  image  of  that  goddess  to  the  Aventine,  we 
may  expect  that  in  the  future  systematic  excava 
tions  we  shall  find  the  same  evidences  of  the 
affinity  of  that  city  with  Falerii  which  we  find 
both  nearer  and  farther  away.  Thus,  the  revela 
tions  of  archaeology  confirm  the  Virgilian  tradition, 
and  that  other  which  states  that  before  Rome 
there  was  an  Hellenic  influence  imposed  on  the 
development  of  the  Tiber  valley,  and  that,  under 
the  hypothesis  that  the  Trojan  and  Greek  were 
of  the  same  stock,  it  may  literally  be  true  that  a 
Trojan  chief  led  a  band  of  emigrants  to  the  Latin 
shores;  but  the  tradition  of  the  foundation  of 
Alba  Longa,  like  that  of  every  other  foundation 
by  the  Greek  migrations,  must  be  taken  as  mean 
ing  that  the  emigrants  occupied  a  city  already  in 
existence,  and  apparently  united  with  the  former 
population.  When  the  same  kind  of  researches 
which  have  been  so  productive  at  Falerii  shall 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     9 

have  been  carried  out  at  Ardea,  Lavinium,  and 
Laurentum,  localities  particularly  identified  with 
the  traditions  of  the  ^Eneid,  and  at  which  no 
excavations  have  been  made,  we  shall  know  more 
about  the  general  character  and  local  variations 
of  the  so-called  Trojan  migration;  but  we  know 
already  there  is  the  highest  probability  that  they 
were  all  under  the  same  influences,  and  that  the 
line  of  demarkation  of  the  region  so  influenced 
was  somewhat  to  the  north  of  Falerii,  beyond 
which  the  immigration  imposing  itself  on  the  com 
posite  Italic  element  was  Etruscan,  no  evidence  of 
which  is  found  in  Falerii  or  in  the  Latin  towns; 
and  as  on  both  sides  of  this  line  appears  the 
evidence  of  the  earlier  uniform  Italic  civilisation, 
we  have  the  right  to  assume  that  the  Hellenic  and 
Etruscan  immigrations  were  so  nearly  coincident 
that  the  one  locally  excluded  the  other,  and  that 
they  were  both  superposed  on  the  Italic  popula 
tion,  which  here  became  Latin  and  in  the  north 
Etruscan.  Of  this  so  modified  stock,  the  central 
point  of  gathering  became  Rome  on  the  south 
and  Clusium  on  the  north. 

From  that  time  forward  Rome  has  been  the 
most  powerful  centre  of  attraction  on  the  surface 
of  the  earth,  first  to  the  Old  World,  and  later  to 
the  New.  Even  to-day,  wreck  as  it  is  of  its  old 
glory,  it  is  more  peculiarly  the  "  city  of  the  soul " 
than  any  other  that  we  visit.  With  due  respect 
for  the  theories  of  others,  this  is  to  me  un 
accounted  for  by  any  evident  reason;  neither  the 
republic,  nor  the  empire,  nor  the  church  can 


10     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

explain  it,  but  rather  this  mysterious  attraction 
explains  them.  When  I  first  came  to  Rome  there 
was  a  curious  phenomenon  which  struck  me — the 
gathering  together  of  peasants  from  the  outlying 
villages  on  festal  days,  at  certain  localities  where 
there  was  no  visible  attraction,  neither  wine  shop 
nor  lottery  office,  and  not  even  an  open  place  for 
the  gathering,  but  a  narrow  street  and  a  narrower 
sidewalk.  One  of  these  spots,  which  I  was  in  the 
habit  of  passing,  I  found,  by  reference  to  the  map 
of  the  ancient  city,  to  be  in  the  space  once  occupied 
by  the  forum  of  Nerva;  and  the  only  solution  of 
the  problem  that  appears  to  me  is  that,  in  a 
remote  epoch,  this  had  been  the  marketing  place 
of  the  ancestors  of  these  peasants,  who,  by  the 
unintelligent,  hereditary  habit,  always  gathered 
there  to  hear  the  news  and  meet  their  gossips  or 
clients.  Rome  was  then  full  of  such  survivals  of 
ancient  customs,  some  of  which  continue,  as  may 
be  seen  in  the  Piazza  Montanara,  where  the  agri 
cultural  labourers  still  go  in  their  picturesque 
costumes  to  make  their  engagements  with  the 
padroni. 

In  those  days  the  Pope  was  king;  life  was  cast 
in  the  mediaeval  mould;  all  progress  was  an 
offence,  not  only  to  the  custom  of  the  place,  but 
to  the  fitness  of  it,  and  the  new-comer  had  hardly 
ceased  to  be  new  when  he  became  conservative 
and  citizen  of  this  imperial  Lotophagitis.  Exis 
tence  was  a  dream,  and  almost  as  cheap  as  one ; 
there  was  no  morning  paper  to  harry  our  serenity, 
or  thrust  the  daily  disaster  of  a  distant  and  in- 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     11 

different  community  on  our  tranquillity;  we 
learned  of  most  events  when  they  had  ceased  to 
be  startling.  After  the  church,  art  was  the  theme 
of  most  thought,  and  the  artist  was  the  most 
important  being  after  the  priest.  Roman  life  had 
its  tides — high  spring  at  Christmas  and  Easter,  and 
dead  ebb  at  midsummer — but  there  was  never  any 
bustle  or  fever  of  business ;  there  was  no  growth ; 
there  were  no  new  houses ;  there  was  no  blocking 
the  streets  with  building  material,  no  laying  of 
drains  or  disturbance  of  the  soil,  no  enterprise, 
and  no  new  trades.  The  head  of  the  great  hospital 
of  St.  Spirito  was  one  of  my  friends,  and  in  con 
junction  with  him  and  two  or  three  capitalists  I 
organised  a  syndicate  to  supply  the  hospitals  and 
city  with  American  ice  at  the  price,  delivered  at 
Civita  Vecchia,  of  the  snow,  which  was  otherwise 
the  only  resource,  delivered  at  the  pits  on  the 
Alban  hills,  where  it  was  stored  for  summer  use. 
But  the  offer  was  refused;  it  would  have  dis 
turbed  the  vested  rights  of  the  snow-harvesters. 
The  sick  in  the  hospitals  had  been  so  served  for 
hundreds  of  years,  and  might  be  still.  Every 
innovation  was  resisted  as  of  the  devil,  and  the 
possible  horse  of  Troy  for  stealthy  invasion.  Rome 
had  so  maintained  its  position  for  the  centuries  of 
the  papal  rule ;  why  change  ? 

Outside  this  compact,  grey,  silent  city,  in  which 
the  picturesqueness  of  the  ensemble  was  so  in 
contradiction  to  the  stiffness  and  general  ugliness 
of  the  details,  was  a  cordon  of  gardens  and  vine 
yards  overlying  ancient  villa  sites,  abounding  in 


12     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

the  most  interesting  material ;  ruins  in  an  almost 
infinite  variety  in  their  pathetic  abandon  to  the 
dissolving  influences  of  nature  —  baths,  tombs, 
temples,  theatres,  palaces,  aqueducts;  and  outside 
them,  and  the  most  picturesque  of  all,  the  old 
Aurelian  wall,  which  meandered  across  highway 
and  through  villa  grounds,  a  simulacrum  of  de 
fence,  but  a  most  eloquent  record  of  dead  empire, 
marking  the  recession  of  its  inhabited  region ; 
then,  beyond  the  debatable  ground  between  occu 
pation  and  desolation,  came  the  Campagna.  The 
Campagna  of  Rome  has  become  the  commonplace 
of  poet  and  orator  when  they  have  to  deal  with 
fallen  grandeur,  but  no  poet  or  orator,  unless  he 
were  a  painter,  ever  saw  more  than  a  fraction  of 
its  beauty;  few  even  of  the  landscape  painters 
have  seen  it  all.  There  were,  in  those  years  of 
which  I  write,  some  who  passed  their  lives  in  the 
hunt  for  its  "  subjects " ;  painting  till  the  twilight 
came  on;  hurrying  in  to  pass  the  gates  before 
they  closed  for  the  night,  reckless  of  the  chill  and 
the  night-mists  which  even  in  midsummer  follow 
the  day,  content  to  run  the  risks  of  malaria  if 
so  they  might  catch  the  intoxicating  impressions 
of  that  unique  and  supreme  nightfall,  with  its 
tremulous  purple  sky  behind  the  purpler  Alban 
hills  at  the  east,  and  its  mellow  gold  at  the  west, 
blinding  the  eyes  more  by  the  expanse  of  its 
glow  than  its  brilliancy,  more  by  the  deep  in 
tensity  of  its  light  than  by  glare ;  by  that  luminous 
depth  which  is  more  the  quality  of  the  Italian 
atmosphere  than  the  intensity  of  its  blue,  or  the 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     13 

variety  of  colour  on  the  sunset  clouds.  He  who 
lived  amidst  these  influences  in  the  young  enthu 
siasm  of  art  and  beautiful  nature  will  remember 
the  Campagna  as  he  will  remember  no  other 
landscape  on  earth;  it  is  like  a  phrase  of  the 
noblest  poetry,  ineffaceable  from  its  unapproach 
able  simplicity.  In  those  days,  the  joyous  fra 
ternity  of  the  brush  were  to  be  seen  on  every 
road  that  led  into  the  Campagna,  at  almost  every 
season  of  the  year.  Down  the  Tiber,  even  within 
the  city  walls,  pictures  made  to  hand  met  the  eye 
at  every  turn  of  the  river;  one  found  Claude  and 
Turner  wherever  one  went. 

That  phase  of  Rome  is  gone  forever — gone  as 
surely  as  the  simplicity  and  stern  morality  of  the 
republic,  the  splendour  of  the  empire,  or  the 
moral  oppression  of  the  papal  rule.  Rome  can 
no  more  be  the  home  of  art  again  than  it  can 
be  the  seat  of  universal  empire  or  the  patrimony 
of  St.  Peter.  What  has  come  is  not  so  clear.  The 
Romans  of  to-day  have  none  of  the  distinctive 
virtues  of  either  preceding  epoch,  except  military 
courage,  which  the  Italians  have  never  lacked, 
though  they  have  not  always  been  fortunate  in 
the  employment  of  it.  Taste  was  never  a  char 
acteristic  of  Rome  at  any  age,  but  in  the  great 
days  the  Romans  built  well.  This  cannot  be  said 
now,  and  all  that  is  most  modern  is  most  exe 
crable;  all  that  is  oldest  is  most  execrated  and 
profaned.  The  new  barbarians  who,  in  the  present 
dispensation,  swoop  down  from  cisalpine  Gaul, 
reared  in  the  civic  ideals  of  Genoa  and  Turin, 


14     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

have  no  sympathy  with  the  monumental  records 
of  Rome,  and  no  conception  of  anything  to  replace 
them.  The  Rome  of  1870  was  dirty,  but  dignified ; 
inconvenient  for  people  with  modern  tastes,  but 
most  comfortable  for  those  who  had  adapted 
themselves  to  its  mediaeval  ways.  The  Rome  of 
1897  is  comfortable  for  nobody;  the  miles  of 
new  streets  are  filled  mainly  with  huge,  ugly 
tenement  houses,  stuccoed  flimsies,  abhorrent 
without  and  inhospitable  within  —  a  tasteless 
waste,  where  the  highest  virtue  is  fragility  and 
the  noblest  destiny  demolition.  Of  the  delightful 
gardens  which  used  to  exist  within  the  circuit  of 
the  wall  of  Aurelianus,  the  only  considerable  frag 
ment  remaining  is  that  of  the  English  Embassy; 
and  that,  too,  had  been  marked  out  in  building  lots, 
and  has  been  saved  only  by  the  protest  of  Her 
Majesty's  Government  backed  by  the  Times  and 
the  Italian  archaeological  authorities.  The  famous 
Ludovisi  gardens,  the  pride  of  papal  Rome,  and 
amongst  the  most  beautiful  in  Europe,  have  been 
built  over,  and  the  vengeful  lover  of  Old  Rome 
sees  with  a  malignant  satisfaction  the  long  rows 
of  untenanted  windows  of  the  huge  apartment 
houses  of  the  quarter,  over  whose  portals,  newest 
in  stucco  and  whitewash,  he  reads  the  last  remnant 
of  the  language  of  the  Romans,  "Est  locanda" 
The  Ludovisi  gardens  were  offered  to  the  muni 
cipality  for  3,000,000  lire,  and  refused,  while  it 
spent  3,700,000  lire  in  the  purchase  and  demolition 
of  a  single  palace  on  the  Corso,  to  make  a  vacant 
space  less  than  the  hundredth  part  of  the  gardens. 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW    15 

The  transformation  of  Rome  during  the  past 
twenty  years  is  unique  in  the  history  of  civilisa 
tion  for  barbarism,  extravagance,  and  corruption; 
never  since  the  world  began  was  so  much  money 
spent  to  do  so  much  evil. 

But  Rome  survives  it,  as  it  has  survived  the 
wrecking  of  the  Goths,  the  Vandals,  the  Constable 
de  Bourbon;  survives  even  the  Barbari  and  the 
Barberini.  The  Campagna  still  undulates  into 
distance,  if  somewhat  encroached  on  near  the 
walls,  and  the  arches  of  the  Claudian  aqueduct 
still  measure  off  the  space  with  their  gigantic 
stride;  the  Appian  Way  is  not  made  a  modern 
cemetery,  and  there  is  left  material  for  the  artist 
who  has  the  courage  to  return;  Aricia,  Nemi, 
Tivoli,  and  the  far-off  Olevano  remain  unchanged. 
The  papal  city  has  been  comparatively  little  altered 
by  the  expropriations  except  along  the  Tiber,  and 
nobody  need  go  to  the  new  quarter  who  does  not 
choose  so  to  do.  Life  is  dear,  too  dear  for  the 
cosmopolitan  artist  folk  who  used  to  make  one  of 
the  principal  attractions  of  the  city  to  westerners, 
and  with  very  few  notable  exceptions  they  are 
succeeded  by  modern  Italians,  of  whose  art  little 
is  to  be  said.  There  is  old  Giovanni  Costa,  like 
Titian,  outliving  the  school  of  poetic  landscape, 
and  generously  teaching  its  traditions  to  such  as 
will  learn  them  and  the  Academy  of  France,  until 
lately  presided  over  by  the  veteran  Hebert,  the 
last  of  the  school  of  healthy  religious  thought 
in  painting  —  that  to  which  surfaces  were  not 
enough,  and  who  were  more  troubled  as  to  what 


16    THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

they  should  paint  than  how  they  should  paint  it: 
but  neither  the  one  nor  the  other  has  had  much 
influence  on  the  younger  men.  The  Cafe  Greco, 
founded  in  the  day  of  Salvator  Rosa,  has  become  a 
German  pastry-cookery,  and  the  place  where  once 
all  the  artists  of  Rome  used  to  meet,  along  with 
poets  and  the  minor  brood  of  the  Muses,  is  no 
longer  to  be  recognised  by  the  relic-hunter.  De 
tails  disappear,  but  the  eternal  city  looms  above 
them  like  Mont  Blanc  over  the  little  intervening 
hills  when  seen  from  a  distance,  or  like  St.  Peter's 
from  the  Campagna,  and  will  do  so  when  the 
present  system  is  in  ruins  and  ivy  grows  over  the 
new  quarter.  All  these  crudities  will  disappear; 
this  pinchbeck  Paris  is  only  another  illusion  which 
time  will  dissipate,  and  Rome  will  be  again  what 
it  has  always  been  from  its  republican  days,  even 
though  the  new  republic  comes  and  the  papacy 
departs,  a  centre  of  attraction  to  a  spiritual  cos 
mopolitan  population,  never  a  centre  of  trade  or 
business;  and  the  people  who  know  it  are  not 
those  who  are  born  in  it,  but  those  who  are  born 
to  it  and  its  liberties  of  thought. 

In  the  cosmopolitan  sense,  it  was  a  great  mis 
fortune  that  Rome  became  the  capital  of  Italy, 
but  it  was  fated.  The  same  attraction  that  drew 
the  Greek,  the  Sabine,  the  Gaul  and  the  Carlov- 
ingian,  the  Etruscan  Pontifex  Maximus  and  St. 
Paul,  has  brought  the  Garibaldian  and  the  house 
of  Savoy.  But,  after  all,  the  interference  with 
the  true  enjoyment  of  Rome  by  its  real  citizen 
is  not  great  of  material.  It  will  be  a  place  of 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     17 

pilgrimage  to  the  Catholic  when  the  Pope  has 
gone,  if  he  ever  goes;  the  historian,  the  archae 
ologist,  the  poet,  and  the  artist  will  always  be  its 
citizens,  though  holding  no  allegiance  to  Pope  or 
King,  subject  neither  to  taxation  nor  conscription, 
and  though  disinterested  in  its  real  estate.  He 
owns  it  who  feels  its  spiritual  (not  ecclesiastical) 
attraction.  To  him  there  is  no  city  on  the  earth 
which  can  content  him  after  it.  He  may  live 
in  New  York  or  London,  Venice  or  Naples,  but 
will  always  be  more  or  less  a  stranger  there, 
and  be  ready  to  go  back  to  Rome.  The  new 
civilisation,  while  it  has  done  much  to  disfigure 
and  degrade  the  city,  has  also  done  much  to  im 
prove  it:  made  it  cleaner  and  healthier,  expelled 
the  highway  robbers  from  the  streets  and  the 
brigands  from  the  Campagna  —  matters  of  less 
importance  to  the  true  Roman  than  to  the  pros 
perous  man  of  business,  but  to  none  indifferent. 
Life  is  dearer  than  it  used  to  be,  but  the  rate 
of  insurance  on  it  is  lower  and  the  ratio  of  the 
doctor's  bill  less,  and  the  cost  is  not  prohibitory 
to  the  man  of  small  means.  He  who  lives  in 
his  own  house  in  Mayfair  or  Fifth  Avenue  is 
content  in  Rome  with  a  small  apartment  in  a 
crooked  street,  and  on  the  third  or  fourth  storey, 
and  does  not  so  stand  on  state  but  that  he  has 
his  dinner  in  from  the  nearest  cook-shop  and 
his  wine  by  the  flask ;  has  one  servant,  instead  of 
three  which  he  used  to  have  when  on  his  social 
dignity;  uses  cabs,  and  thinks  it  no  derogation 
not  to  keep  a  carriage,  and  so  lives  on  the  rent 


18     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

of  his  house  in  Mayfair.  There  are  still  quarters 
to  be  found  in  the  old  palaces  in  the  papal  city, 
but  for  people  accustomed  to  fires  there  is  some 
times  a  difficulty  in  keeping  warm;  for  the 
Italians  have  a  superstition  about  fires,  and  so 
it  happens  that  instead  of  the  cheerful  grate 
one  has  to  be  content  with  a  stove,  whose  pipe 
may  go  out  at  the  window,  in  one  or  two  of 
the  chambers,  and  be  dependent  on  the  rarely 
absent  sun  for  the  rest.  The  fuel  is  dear,  but 
then  little  is  wanted,  and  there  are  few  days 
when  one  cannot  enjoy  the  outdoors  and  the 
sunshine. 

Society  there  is  none.  The  Romans  are  not  a 
hospitable  people,  but  one  does  not  come  to  be 
with  them.  They  are  much  divided  into  cliques 
and  classes,  and  the  great  families  content  them 
selves  in  general  with  one  great  ball  each  year; 
very  exclusive,  and,  if  I  may  judge  by  hearsay  of 
the  foreigners  who  now  and  then  attend,  very 
dull.  With  two  or  three  exceptions,  the  high 
nobility  of  Rome  are  as  much  of  the  Middle  Ages 
as  the  old  churches,  and  to  the  spiritual  Roman 
they  are  mere  shadows;  we  walk  through  and 
past  them,  and  know  not  they  are  there.  As  a 
general  thing,  foreign  society  is  organised  apart. 
The  old  Roman  aristocracy  is  divided  into  Blacks 
and  Whites,  Pope  or  King,  and  the  two  sections 
never  mingle;  the  embassies  from  the  same 
government  to  the  Vatican  and  the  Quirinal  have 
no  relations  with  each  other,  and  the  Blacks  are 
not  in  the  books  of  the  embassies  to  the  King, 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     19 

or  the  Whites  invited  to  the  receptions  of  those 
to  the  Pope.  If  the  new-comer  will  see  the  world 
and  can,  he  must  choose  under  which  colour  he 
will  take  it,  but  in  any  case  he  will  not  find  what 
in  western  lands  is  known  as  hospitality. 

One  of  the  most  prominent  English  statesmen 
said  to  me  one  day,  in  Rome,  that  the  life  of 
public  men  was  getting  to  be  so  laborious  in  the 
new  political  conditions  in  England  that  it  would 
soon  be  a  necessity  to  take  refuge  abroad  from 
the  constant  demands  of  one's  constituents,  and 
that  Italy,  as  the  only  available  place  of  rest 
and  refuge,  would  be  more  and  more  resorted 
to  by  them.  Switzerland  was  useful  only  for  a 
portion  of  the  year ;  France  was  not  far  enough 
or  restful  enough;  and  so  it  must  happen  that 
Italy  would  become,  to  an  increasing  extent,  the 
refuge  of  overworked  statesmen.  And  of  Italian 
cities,  there  is  no  question  of  the  greater  avail 
ability  of  Rome  over  all  others.  Florence  is  more 
interesting  in  the  art  of  the  Middle  Ages ;  Venice 
holds  the  palm  for  its  picturesqueness  in  the 
spring  and  early  summer,  but  its  winters  are 
bleak  and  cheerless;  Naples  draws  more  from  its 
surroundings,  Sorrento  and  Capri,  than  it  offers 
in  itself;  but  Rome  contains  all  that  is  most 
interesting  in  Italy.  The  superstition  as  to  its 
sanitary  condition  is  the  bugbear  which  most 
militates  against  it.  This  runs  back  into  the 
dark  ages,  but  is  unjustified  by  any  statistics  to 
which  I  can  get  access.  In  a  residence  of  nearly 
a  dozen  years  in  the  aggregate,  and  extending 


20     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

over  a  period  of  nearly  thirty,  I  have  never  had 
in  my  family  a  single  serious  illness  or  a  case 
of  typhoid  or  malaria,  and  in  my  personal 
acquaintance  I  have  never  known  half-a-dozen 
cases  of  intermittent  or  malarial  fever,  and  not 
one  of  any  gravity;  while  in  a  residence  of  five 
years  in  Florence  we  had  eight  cases  of  typhoid 
amongst  seven  persons.  I  have  repeatedly  stayed 
in  Rome  through  the  entire  summer  without 
any  discomfort  or  inconvenience,  and  the  late 
English  ambassador,  Lord  Saville,  was  accustomed 
to  spend  his  summers  at  the  Embassy,  saying 
that  he  found  no  place  so  comfortable  all  the 
year  round  as  Rome.  I  have  never  met  with 
a  case  of  the  so-called  "pernicious"  fever,  and 
the  physicians  whom  I  know,  and  who  attend 
foreigners  mostly,  bear  a  like  testimony.  Dr 
Drummond,  who  has  practised  here  for  years, 
says  that  he  never  saw  a  case.  The  instances  of 
malarial  fever  I  have  known  were  similar  to  the 
intermittents  of  our  own  country — annoying,  but 
not  dangerous.  The  statistics  of  the  Italian 
sanitary  department  are  drawn  up  with  the 
greatest  care  and  exactitude,  and  for  the  pur 
pose  of  improving  the  sanitary  condition  of  the 
country,  therefore  with  no  reference  to  publica 
tion  or  to  foreign  opinion;  and  I  have  before  me 
those  of  the  deaths  by  malarial  fevers  for  the 
commune  of  Rome,  including  the  Campagna  and 
the  outlying  towns  and  villages,  Ostia  and  its 
marshes,  to  the  sea,  with  all  the  malarial  districts 
in  the  Ager  Romanus;  the  division  of  the  city 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     21 

from  these  being  impracticable,  as  the  peasants 
all  come  to  the  Roman  hospitals  for  treatment. 
In  these  returns,  out  of  a  population  of  over 
500,000,  the  total  of  deaths  by  malarial  fevers  was, 
in  1890,  308.  The  amelioration  of  the  condition 
of  public  health  under  the  government  of  Crispi 
can  be  judged  from  the  diminution  in  the  deaths, 
which  has  been  from  600  in  1887,  gradually  and 
regularly,  to  300  in  the  past  year.  With  a  system 
of  thermal  establishments  such  as  the  ancient 
Romans  had,  the  deaths  by  malarial  fevers  would 
be  still  less ;  for  there  is  no  agency  more  effective 
in  extirpating  malaria  than  the  vapour  bath,  yet 
there  is  not  a  tolerable  Roman  bath  in  Rome. 

I  am  in  continual  receipt  of  letters  asking  if  it 
is  safe  to  come  to  Rome  as  early  as  October,  or 
if  it  is  safe  to  stay  as  late  as  May;  and  not  un- 
frequently  I  meet  people  who  think  that  the  visit 
at  any  season  is  dangerous  to  life!  Nothing  is 
so  invincible  as  superstition.  If  we  leave  Rome 
at  all  for  the  summer,  it  is  only  about  the  first  of 
August,  and  we  return  by  the  end  of  September; 
not  one-tenth  of  the  population  leaves,  and  the 
death-rate  is  lower  in  summer  than  in  winter. 
From  the  first  of  November  till  the  August  rains 
begin  to  fall,  the  worst  parts  of  the  Campagna 
may  safely  be  visited,  if  the  sunset  hours  are 
avoided,  and  even  in  the  intervening  months  the 
midday  is  free  from  danger ;  but  from  the  first 
rains  of  August  to  the  time  of  the  setting  in  of 
frost,  it  is  not  wise  to  be  in  most  parts  of  the 
Campagna  towards  sunset,  though  there  are 


22     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

sections  in  which  it  is  not  safe  to  go  to  sleep 
at  night  in  any  season.  The  whole  question  of 
malaria  in  Italy  is  one  of  exaggerated  import 
ance.  I  have  travelled  in  the  worst  parts  of  the 
Maremme,  which  are  regarded  as  the  most  deadly 
and  malarial  of  Italy,  as  late  as  the  latter  half 
of  June,  and  have  found  the  harvesters  at  work 
in  gangs,  and  very  few  cases  of  fever  anywhere; 
while  at  Grosseto,  the  capital  of  the  Maremme, 
which  the  guide-books  tell  us  is  abandoned  by 
the  inhabitants  on  the  first  of  May,  I  found  the 
entire  population  on  the  ramparts  listening  to 
the  band  till  late  into  the  evening,  and  none 
had  as  yet  gone  to  the  hills,  which  they  do  only 
to  a  limited  extent  the  first  of  July.  I  had  an 
introduction  to  one  family,  the  mother  of  which, 
whose  life  had  always  been  passed  in  Grosseto,  had 
never  known,  at  the  age  of  sixty,  what  inter 
mittent  fever  was.  I  know  of  no  district  of  Italy 
in  which  it  is  not  practicable  to  travel  ten 
months  out  of  the  twelve,  if  one  takes  the  pre 
cautions  not  to  sleep  in  a  malarial  locality,  or 
drink  water  that  is  not  known  to  be  pure. 

Typhoids  are  common  in  all  great  cities,  but  in 
Rome  less  so  than  in  most  cities  of  its  size;  and 
the  returns  to  the  sanitary  authorities  are  a 
proof  that  their  frequency  is  diminishing  in  pro 
portion  as  the  rigorous  regulations  are  effective 
and  evasion  is  prevented.  The  water  supply  of 
Rome  is  probably  the  best  as  to  purity  and  the 
most  abundant  in  quantity  of  any  furnished  to 
great  cities.  Typhoid  very  rarely  occurs  among 


THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW     23 

the  inhabitants  of  the  better  class  except  from 
drinking  water  at  some  wayside,  or  temporarily 
infected,  spring.  The  main  supply,  that  by  the 
Acqua  Marcia,  is  secure  against  pollution,  and  is 
everywhere  accessible,  so  that  no  house  need  be 
without  it.  The  sanitary  laws  are  inflexible,  and 
the  tenant  of  a  neglected  house  has  always  the 
remedy  in  his  own  hands.  I  have  no  hesitation 
in  saying  that  a  person  in  moderate  circumstances, 
able  to  choose  his  quarters,  can  pass  the  months 
between  September  and  July  in  Rome  under  as 
favourable  conditions  of  health  and  comfort  as 
in  any  city  in  Europe ;  and,  with  less  precautions 
against  the  heat  than  in  New  York  one  must  take 
against  the  cold,  he  may  pass  the  entire  year. 

In  summer,  too,  we  have  excellent  seaside 
resorts — Anzio  and  Palo,  and  our  hill  country 
at  Albano,  Aricia,  Nemi,  Frascati,  and  the  other 
castelli;  and  if  there  were  a  little  enterprise  in 
Italy,  we  should  have  summer  resorts  in  the 
Abruzzi  delightful  in  their  sanitary  and  pictur 
esque  features,  but  this  remains  for  future 
generations.  Now  a  civilised  man  can  hardly 
pass  a  day  in  any  of  the  mountain  villages  or 
towns ;  filthy  they  are,  beyond  exaggeration.  It 
is  enough  to  insist  on  the  advantages  of  Rome 
as  a  winter  station,  and  as  the  fittest  city  of 
winter  refuge  for  the  exhausted  and  disabled, 
hors  de  coiribat  in  the  battle  of  life,  to  whom 
political  affinities  are  immaterial;  for  the  refugees 
from  the  nervous  pressure  of  America,  the  social, 
political,  and  business  burdens  of  England;  from 


24     THE  OLD  ROME  AND  THE  NEW 

the  immitigable  boredom  of  German  life,  as  well 
as  the  glittering  superficiality  of  Parisian:  all 
such  may  meet  here  on  the  neutral  ground  of 
traditions,  memories,  and  associations  that  ante 
date  all  our  national  divisions,  and  even  all  ex 
isting  nationalities.  Quod  est  in  votis. 


MARATHON    AND    ITS    BRIGANDS 

THE  trip  from  Athens  to  Marathon  is  no  joke, 
especially  in  summer,  and  when  brigands  are 
known  to  be  sauntering  unmolested  along  Mount 
Parnes,  a  night's  walk  away.  Yet,  when  Messrs 
Goodenough  and  Cookson,  American  and  English 
consular  officials,  escaped  from  Constantinople  for 
a  holiday,  and  stirred  me  out  of  my  hot  quarters 
at  Athens  to  show  them  the  lions,  etc.,  of  course 
it  became  necessary  to  put  this  excursion  in  the 
programme.  It  was  in  August  of  1869,  and  we 
knew  that  there  were  brigands  at  Phylse,  and  did 
not  know  that  they  were  not  nearer.  In  fact,  the 
people  of  Athens  were  so  panic-stricken  that 
they  would  not  go  into  the  outskirts  of  the  town 
in  the  evening ;  it  was  clear  to  the  popular  appre 
hension  that  we  were  besieged,  and  that  the  roi 
des  brigands,  whoever  he  might  be  for  the  time, 
was  ruler  of  all  the  country  round. 

So,  as  our  trip  was  to  be  in  the  nature  of  an 
invasion  of  an  enemy's  country,  I  decided  to  make 
it  a  surprise,  and  with  strict  injunctions  of 
secrecy  on  all  around,  went,  at  nightfall  of  the 
day  before  we  were  to  make  the  excursion,  to 
the  Commandant  de  place  and  asked  an  escort 
— "not  that  there  was  any  use  in  it,  but  the 

25 


26          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

strangers  were  anxious,"  etc.  The  Commandant 
stroked  his  moustache,  expressed  his  sense  of  the 
high  honour  of  having  been  permitted  to  make 
my  acquaintance,  offered  me  a  cigarette,  and  we 
talked  European  politics,  the  Cretan  insurrection, 
etc.,  and  he  assured  me,  as  I  rose  to  take  my  leave, 
that  an  escort  of  cavalry  should  be  waiting  at 
my  door  at  5  A.M.  the  next  day.  I  went  at  10 
P.M.  to  the  owner  of  horses  and  carriages  and 
ordered  a  carriage  for  the  early  hour,  and  a 
relay  of  horses  to  be  sent  forward  at  once  to  the 
half-way  station.  I  knew  that  if,  even  then,  one 
of  the  friends  of  the  brigands  in  town  (by  force 
of  circumstances  I  should  have  said  the  carriage- 
owner,  if  I  had  been  pressed  to  select  one)  should 
send  word  to  his  colleagues  that  four  distin 
guished  foreigners,  of  whom  two  certainly  were 
ambassadors,  were  to  start  for  Marathon  on  the 
morrow,  they  would  not  get  the  news  before 
morning,  and  would  not  dare  cross  the  plain  by 
day,  so  that  we  could  reach  Athens  again  before 
they  could  get  upon  our  road. 

I  awoke  with  the  grey  dawn  and  heard  the 
hoofs  of  the  troopers'  horses  clattering  on  the 
pavement  in  front  of  the  house,  and,  running 
over  to  the  hotel,  found  my  friends  wasting  the 
precious  coolness  in  deliberate  breakfast.  I  in 
spected  the  horses,  bullied  the  driver  for  having 
brought  us  the  shabbiest  carriage  in  Athens  (by 
way  of  cutting  down  in  advance  his  claim  for 
backsheesh,  or  extra  pay  on  any  score),  inter 
jected  a  little  Western  celerity  into  the  Eastern 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          27 

combination,  and  we  started,  picking  up  the 
escort  en  route.  The  road  (that  which  conducts 
to  Chalcis)  is  very  good  for  a  few  miles,  and 
we  rattled  along  until  we  had  passed  Hymettus 
and  emerged  on  the  plains  which  slope  towards 
Euboea,  when  we  turned  sharp  off  by  a  bad 
waggon-track,  rather  than  carriage-road,  through 
the  olive-orchards,  and  then  through  a  pine- 
forest  as  solitary  as  the  backwoods  of  America. 
No  habitation,  man,  or  grazing  beast  even,  was 
to  be  seen ;  no  tinkle  of  goat-bells  to  be  heard. 
In  the  midst  of  this  forest,  by  the  side  of  a 
brook,  seeming  at  first  sight  a  succession  of 
stagnant  pools,  bordered  by  a  luxuriant  growth 
of  blackberries,  oleanders,  and  rich  grass,  we 
found  our  relay  waiting.  There  was  no  delay  in 
changing,  and  about  10  A.M.  we  emerged  from 
the  wood  on  the  marsh  -  bordered  plain  of 
Marathon. 

The  blue  sea  now  breaks  farther  out  than 
when  the  Persian  keels  fretted  it  and  marked 
the  sand  that  now  lies  hundreds  of  feet  inland; 
and  many  acres  of  the  marsh,  where,  doubtless, 
Persian  bones  and  Persian  trophies  are  bedded 
to  this  day,  are  now  solid  earth.  We  drove  up 
to  the  mound  through  the  maize-fields,  and  be 
tween  the  strips  of  vineyard,  where  the  villagers 
of  New  Marathon  were  watching  the  early 
grapes;  and  having  climbed  the  mound,  made 
its  circuit,  and  hunted  for  fragments  of  flint 
instruments,  which  form  one  of  the  items  of 
interest  at  Marathon,  we  bought  of  the  patriarch 


28          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

of  the  adjoining  fields — who  sat  under  a  shelter 
of  reeds  guarding  his  riches,  lest  they  took  to 
themselves  wings — a  supply  of  water-melons, 
scarcely  ripe  grapes,  and  cantaloupes;  each  trooper 
confiscating  one  of  the  former,  and  quenching 
his  thirst  in  the  saddle.  Then,  having  listened 
to  the  guide's  tale  of  the  battle,  oft  told,  and 
ever  growing  in  wondrous  inequalities  of  heroism 
and  butchery:  and  looked  where  he  told  us  (and 
Murray,  ever-to-be-consulted,  confirmed,)  that  the 
Greeks  held  their  position  and  the  Persians 
landed :  having,  in  short,  "  done "  the  place  after 
the  manner  of  the  guide-book-led  tourist,  we 
drove  back  to  the  edge  of  the  forest  for  shelter 
from  the  intense  sun  while  we  lunched. 

I  think  that  timete  Danaos  must  be  one  of 
the  things  birched  into  us  at  school,  for,  with  an 
immense  liking  for  the  race,  I  have  an  instinctive 
distrust  of  the  preternatural  shrewdness  of  the 
true  Achaian,  and  our  driver  was  of  the  genuine 
type,  and  had  an  uncanny  way  of  looking  across 
the  bridge  of  his  nose  towards  the  mountains, 
which  made  me  uneasy. 

However,  we  lunched,  drank  copiously  of  good 
wine  of  Phalerum,  while  the  driver  pottered 
about  his  carriage  and  horses,  to  such  good 
purpose  that,  when  finally  we  started  on  the 
home  road,  we  had  not  gone  half-a-mile  before 
the  carriage  came  to  a  standstill,  out  of  order. 
One  of  the  wheels  refused  to  revolve.  Nothing 
was  broken,  so  far  as  could  be  seen;  but  no 
efforts  of  all  the  persons  concerned  could  make 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          29 

the  wheel  turn,  or  get  it  off  its  axle.  The  ever- 
to-be-suspected  citizen  of  Athens  begged  us,  with 
much  serenity,  to  compose  and  assure  ourselves, 
and  be  comfortable  while  he  sent  to  Athens  for 
another  carriage.  My  misgivings  coming  to  a 
head  very  rapidly,  I  asked  him  when  the  carriage 
would  arrive;  and  he  replied,  in  the  happiest  and 
most  confident  tone,  that  he  hoped  that  it  would 
get  there  by  nightfall.  "Very  well,"  said  I,  "we 
will  go  and  send  it  and  you  will  stay  and  watch 
this  carriage."  The  look  of  blank  amazement  and 
despair  which  came  on  his  face  as  I  pronounced 
this  decision,  as  unappealable  as  a  sentence  of 
Minos,  as  he  saw  in  my  face  and  in  the  air  of 
the  commander  of  my  squad  when  I  pronounced 
it,  was  a  revelation.  Unhitching  the  horses,  and 
dismounting  two  of  the  troopers,  we  rode  back  to 
the  relay  post  at  the  little  bridge,  where  the 
party  of  Lord  Muncaster  was  captured  not  many 
months  later,  and  there  halted  to  wait  for  one  of 
the  dismounted  men,  who  had  been  charged  with 
a  photographic  camera,  and  had  not  kept  up 
with  us.  Meanwhile,  one  of  the  troopers  rode  on 
to  the  next  hamlet  to  see  if  some  kind  of  trap 
could  not  be  obtained;  for,  between  foot- weariness 
and  saddle  -  soreness,  we  were  all  desirous  to 
change  our  method  of  locomotion.  Our  escort 
was  thus  diminished  to  two — the  corporal  and 
one  private.  The  place  was  a  capital  one  for  an 
ambush,  as  the  capturers  of  Lord  Muncaster's 
party  found  it,  and  I  looked  into  the  thick  trees 
growing  each  side  of  the  brook  on  the  bank 


30          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

overlooking  it,  and  in  the  bed  of  it  above  us, 
with  a  certain  nervousness,  which  increased 
when,  after  half-an-hour's  waiting,  the  remaining 
trooper  was  sent  back  to  look  for  the  missing 
camera  and  its  bearer. 

There  was  nothing  for  it,  however,  but  to  wait 
till  the  escort  reassembled;  and  we  lit  our  cigar 
ettes  and  lay  down  under  the  pine-trees.  A  cir 
cumstance  that  assured  me  somewhat  was,  that 
I  found  the  troopers'  carbines  all  unloaded  (they 
were  old-fashioned  flint-lock  smooth-bores)  and 
that  there  was  not  a  single  cartridge  in  the 
company,  from  which  I  saw  that  they  at  least 
anticipated  no  danger.  The  corporal  was  a  jolly, 
good-humoured  veteran,  whose  air  was  that  of 
a  man  ready  for  any  emergency  or  danger.  I 
asked  him  if  he  thought  there  was  any  ground 
for  fear  that,  if  we  were  obliged  to  wait  long 
there,  we  might  be  carried  off  by  some  of  the 
country  -  people,  brigands  pro  tempore?  He  re 
plied  with  the  significant  Greek  negative,  a 
silent  pointing  upward  of  the  nose,  accompanied  by 
a  slight  arching  of  the  brows,  and,  after  another 
puff  or  two  of  his  cigarette,  said:  "No;  we  know 
all  the  brigands,  and  generally  know  where  they 
are.  They  could  not  stay  here  twenty-four  hours 
without  our  knowing  it,  and  we  know  that  there 
have  been  none  on  this  side  of  Pentelicus  for 
several  days.  The  common  people  here,"  he 
added,  "  are  very  honest  and  quiet,  but  very 
poor." 

"  Perhaps,"  ejaculated  Cookson,  "  the  one  because 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          31 

the  other — put  whichever  you  please  as  cause  or 
effect  in  this  country." 

"  I  was  a  brigand  myself  once,"  said  the 
corporal,  after  the  pause  in  the  conversation  had 
lasted  a  few  minutes;  whereupon  we  all  looked 
at  him  anew,  and  with  a  little  more  animation; 
and  he  added,  as  if  in  partial  disclaimer,  "but 
it  was  only  for  a  few  months." 

"  But  how  did  it  happen  ? "  I  asked ;  for  though 
I  knew  that  there  had  been  brigands  in  the 
Cabinet  in  Greece,  I  did  not  suppose  that  the 
post  of  corporal  in  the  mounted  gendarmerie  was 
a  temptation  to  a  gay  rover  who  had  felt  the 
delight  of  outlawry. 

"It  was  in  this  way,"  replied  he.  "I  used  to 
live  in  Acarnania,  and,  in  one  of  the  elections, 
there  was  a  gentleman  who  had  great  influence 
in  two  or  three  of  the  villages,  and  who  came 
from  Athens  to  help  the  other  side;  and,  as  we 
knew  that  if  these  villages  went  against  us  we 
should  lose  the  election,  it  was  necessary  to  get 
rid  of  him.  The  chiefs  of  our  party  tried  to 
draw  him  over  to  us;  but,  as  he  would  not  come, 
we  had  to  get  up  a  quarrel  in  the  street,  and  he 
was  killed.  I  was  one  of  those  who  made  the 
fight.  I  did  not  strike  a  blow,  but  I  ran  with  the 
others  to  the  mountains  to  wait  till  it  all  could 
be  made  right  again.  But,  in  spite  of  everything, 
the  other  side  got  the  election  and  so  we  could 
not  go  back.  If  our  men  had  been  elected  we 
should  have  been  pardoned.  So  we  went  up  to 
the  Phthiotide  and  joined  a  band  there,  three  of 


32          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

us;  I  stayed  two  years  before  I  had  a  chance  of 
getting  back,  and  that  came  in  the  beginning  of 
the  Cretan  insurrection,  when  many  of  the  bands 
went  over  to  fight  with  the  Turks.  When  I  did 
get  back  they  made  me  corporal,  as  you  see  me; 
and,  when  there  is  any  necessity  to  hunt  the 
brigands,  I  generally  go  with  the  expedition,  for 
I  know  all  the  roads.  But  this  Government  don't 
trouble  them  much.  You  see,  General  Soutzo, 
the  Minister  of  War,  has  got  an  estate  up  in  the 
brigands'  country,  and  he  knows  very  well  that 
if  he  troubles  them  too  much  it  will  be  plundered ; 
and  then  it's  no  use  running  after  them,  for  the 
moment  an  expedition  starts  they  all  go  to  the 
frontier,  and  are  ready  to  cross  over  and  get 
Turkish  protection;  and  there  are  always  some 
Turkish  subjects  in  the  bands,  who  make  it  all 
right  with  the  guards." 

"Did  you  ever  make  any  prizes  while  you  were 
in  the  band?"  I  asked. 

"  No  great  gentlemen ;  only  a  few  Wallachian 
and  Bulgarian  merchants.  The  bands  don't  like 
to  trouble  Franks,  unless  it  is  a  lord  or  some 
very  rich  man  who  can  pay  a  big  ransom,  for  the 
affair  makes  so  much  more  trouble  when  it  is  a 
Frank,  and  they  get  pursued  and  have  to  leave 
their  families  for  a  long  time :  and  it  don't  do," 
he  ejaculated,  with  a  shrug. 

"But  have  they  families  with  them?"  I  asked. 

"Perhaps,"  suggested  Cookson,  "they  have  as 
many  as  they  have  hiding-places." 

The  corporal's  nose  went  up  in  the  air  with  a 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          33 

quiet  expression   of   his  evident   feeling   that   we 
did  not  in  the  least  understand  the  respectability 
of  the   kleptic  calling,   as   he  replied,   "No;  they 
always  stay  near  their  families,  except  when  the 
expeditions  are  out,  and  get  their  supplies  from 
their  relations.    You  must  know  that  when  Com- 
oundouros   was   First  Minister,   there  were   some 
bands  in  the  Morea,  and  the  nomarch  of  Argos. 
the  same  who  caught  Kitzos,  sent  all  the  families 
of  the  brigands  over  to  the  islands,  and  they  had 
to  come  in  and  surrender  in  a  few  weeks;  all  but 
one    band    near    Patras,    and    they    would    have 
come    too,    if    Bulgaris    had    not    come    in   First 
Minister,   and    sent    the    nomarch    away,   because 
they  said   he   violated  the   Constitution.    That  is 
what  makes  the  country  so  poor,  this  changing 
the  Ministers  all  the  time;  and  the  King,  he's  of 
no    use,    only    costs    thirty    million    drachmas    a 
year "  ;    and    the    politician    born    shrugged    his 
shoulders    with    an    expression    of    contempt    for 
such  a  state  of   things.    He  proceeded,  however, 
after    a   moment : — "  The   chiefs   never   allow   the 
members  of  their  bands  to  marry  or  steal  women 
if   they  are    already   married,   because   it   always 
makes  trouble,  and  the  women  betray  the  bands 
to  punish  them.    One  of  our  band  one  day  stole 
a   very  pretty   girl   from   a  village  near   Lamia ; 
and  when  the  chief  ordered  him  to  take  her  back, 
and  he  refused  and  threatened  to  leave  the  band, 
the  chief  shot  him  dead,  and  sent  the  girl  home. 
Her  father  paid  us  well  by  giving  information  of 
a   rich   Bulgarian   wool-merchant,   who  was   buy- 


34          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

ing  wool  in  the  mountains  near  Lamia,  and 
we  carried  him  off,  and  got  twenty  thousand 
drachmas  ransom.  That  was  the  best  capture  we 
made  while  I  was  in  the  band.  We  tried  to 
catch  an  English  lord  once  who  was  going  over 
to  the  Euboaa;  but  some  of  the  people  told  Mr. 
Noel,  an  English  gentleman  who  lives  at  Achmet 
Aga,  and  he  sent  the  lord  warning." 

"How  did  you  know  he  was  a  lord?"    I  asked. 

"Oh,  one  of  the  band  had  a  cousin  who  was 
a  waiter  in  the  hotel  where  the  lord  lived,  and 
he  sent  us  word  that  he  was  coming,  and  that 
he  had  so  much  money  that  he  did  not  know 
how  to  spend  it;  for  he  bought  all  kinds  of  an 
tiquities  for  whatever  price  people  asked  him, 
and  gave  backsheesh  like  a  fool.  If  we  had 
caught  him  we  should  have  made  him  pay  ten 
thousand  pounds  ransom,  and  then  we  should 
have  gone  over  the  frontier  and  bought  property 
in  Epirus,  and  become  Turkish  subjects.  Ten 
thousand  pounds  is  a  good  deal  of  money,"  he 
appended,  by  way  of  reflection. 

Here  he  got  up  and  walked  across  the  bridge 
to  the  brink  of  the  opposite  bank,  and  listened 
if  he  could  catch  any  sound  of  the  horse  of  the 
trooper  sent  after  the  missing  footman.  Nothing. 
What  could  the  matter  be?  Had  they  both  been 
gobbled  up  by  the  brigands?  Their  firearms,  I 
knew,  were  not  loaded,  and  they  could  not  even 
fire  a  shot  of  warning  for  us.  There  was,  how 
ever,  nothing  to  do  but  wait;  and  wait  we  did. 
The  troopers'  saddles  were  very  bad;  one  of  the 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          35 

party  was  no  horseman,  and  was  already  both 
footsore  and  saddle-sore,  for  we  had  come  twelve 
miles  since  the  break-down ;  another  was  a  cripple 
— and  to  get  back  to  Athens  afoot  was,  therefore, 
to  two  of  us  impossible.  Then  we  had  only  three 
available  horses :  the  corporal  being  too  portly 
and  equestrian  to  get  home  afoot,  two  of  the 
gendarmes  being  away  with  their  horses,  and  the 
man  who  had  brought  the  relay  horses  having 
started  for  Athens  on  one  of  his  spare  beasts  to 
hurry  up  the  other  carriage.  Of  the  remaining 
three,  none  had  saddles;  and  the  two  which 
had  brought  us  from  Marathon  were  thoroughly 
jaded.  We  had  ten  or  twelve  miles  still  to  go, 
and  the  prospect  was  not  a  pleasant  one. 

Presently  the  trooper  who  had  been  sent  back 
came  clattering  along  with  the  news  that  the 
missing  comrade  was  not  to  be  found.  He  had 
ridden  back  to  the  carriage,  and  found  no  trace 
of  him  on  the  road.  The  other,  sent  after  a 
vehicle,  had  not  returned,  and  it  was  now  nearly 
mid-afternoon.  We  all  grew  nervous  and  irrit 
able,  and  I  confidently  expected  to  see  the  dirty 
fustanella  appear  in  the  bushes  around.  Cookson 
began,  in  Stamboul  Greek,  with  strong  English 
accent,  to  abuse  the  Government  and  Greece  in 
general,  to  which  the  corporal  replied  imperturb- 
ably,  for  the  Greeks  are  too  much  in  the  habit  of 
hearing  their  State  berated  to  think  much  about 
it ;  and  it  sometimes  occurs  to  me  that,  as  they  do 
really,  in  general,  receive  more  abuse  than  they 
deserve,  it  may  have  had  the  effect  of  diminishing 


36          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

the  self-respect  which  man  or  nation  must  possess, 
to  win  the  respect  of  others.  So  the  corporal 
re-echoed  the  epithets  levelled  at  the  Ministers, 
and  abused  the  King,  who,  he  said,  might  better 
matters  if  he  were  not  so  given  up  to  his 
favourites.  It  is  hard  quarrelling  with  a  man 
who  takes  your  side  in  the  quarrel,  and  we  had 
to  stop  berating  the  Government,  as  the  corporal 
beat  us  out  and  out  in  virulence. 

"But  tell  me,  Stavros,"  said  I,  at  length, 
"what  would  you  do  if  you  were  Minister  of 
War  to  put  down  brigandage?" 

"  Do ! "  replied  he,  the  feather  of  imagination 
tickling  his  importance  so  that  he  became  really 
ministerial  in  dignity.  "I  would  very  soon  stop 
it.  I  would  make  the  villages  pay  all  the  ran 
soms  which  were  taken  in  their  territory.  I 
would  do  as  the  nomarch  of  Argos  did,  and 
send  the  families  of  all  the  brigands  out  to  live 
in  the  islands,  and  I  would  have  all  brigands 
shot  as  soon  as  taken,  instead  of  being  sent 
as  they  are  now,  to  the  Palamidi,  to  wait  for 
a  new  election,  and  then  be  pardoned  to  go  into 
the  provinces  to  make  influence.  But  the  Turk 
ish  Government  must  work  with  ours,  or  there 
cannot  be  an  end  to  it.  Why,  not  a  year  ago, 
when  we  were  going  to  fight  the  Turks  about 
the  Ennosis,  and  Hobart  Pacha  went  to  Syra 
to  take  her,  I  was  with  an  expedition  to  look 
at  the  boundary  near  Arta,  and  the  brigands 
took  two  of  our  officers  who  slept  in  a  village 
without  sentinels,  and  carried  them  over  the 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          37 

frontiers,  and  kept  them,  in  the  Turkish  guard 
house  for  ransom,  and  the  Turkish  captain  had 
part  of  the  ransom.  You  might  as  well  attempt 
to  shut  all  the  fish  into  Piraeus  harbour  as  to 
try  to  shut  the  brigands  off  from  the  boundary. 
If  all  the  lazy  regulars  who  live  in  the  barracks 
of  Athens,  and  do  nothing  but  set  guard  at  the 
palace  and  march  about  town,  were  put  on  the 
boundary,  they  wouldn't  keep  a  man  from  pass 
ing  when  he  liked.  But  they  might  watch  the 
villagers,  to  keep  the  brigands  from  coming 
down  to  get  bread  or  powder,  or  from  capturing 
any  one,  and  in  time  they  would  be  starved  out. 
But  they  must  send  the  families  away  —  that 
will  stop  them  quicker  than  anything  else." 

"But,"  I  said,  "that  is  illegal — it's  against  the 
Constitution." 

"  Bah ! "  said  the  indignant  soldier,  "  we  hear 
of  the  Constitution  when  it  serves  the  Ministers 
— never  when  it  protects  the  people.  The  Con 
stitution  is  like  the  middle  of  a  fast* — you  may 
do  what  you  like  with  it.  There  are  sixty  brig 
ands  in  chains  now  in  the  Palamidi,  and  I'll  lay 
a  wager  that  forty  will  be  pardoned  in  a  year, 
and  yet  the  Constitution  does  not  permit  the 
pardoning  of  a  brigand  without  the  Chambers. 
I  know  fellows  who  have  been  released  two  or 
three  times.  It  is  all  very  well  to  talk  of  con 
stitutions  and  laws;  but  I  think  that  Ministers 

*  The  practice  of  many  in  Greece  is  to  keep  only  the  first  and 
last  weeks  of  the  long  fasts.  Strict  devotees  keep  the  whole,  146 
days  of  each  year. 


38          MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS 

make  them  for  their  own  good,  and  keep  them 
when  they  like.  In  my  opinion,  the  law  that 
does  the  work  is  the  law  we  want,  and  if  I 
was  Minister  I  would  make  law  enough  to  do 
what  I  wanted.  I  know  a  butcher  in  Athens 
who  has  a  brother  a  brigand  in  a  band  near 
Galaxidi,  and  he  keeps  the  band  informed  of  all 
people  going  there;  and  I  suppose  if  we  put 
him  in  prison,  as  he  deserves,  there  would  be  a 
great  talk  about  the  Constitution;  but,  if  I  had 
my  way,  I  would  lock  him  up  in  the  Palamidi, 
and  his  lawyers  with  him.  Your  Constitutions 

may  be  all  very  well  in  other  countries,  but " 

and  he  finished  by  a  thumb  over  his  shoulder. 
"Constitution!"  he  ejaculated  again,  after  a 
little,  with  a  contemptuous  shrug,  as  though  his 
ideas  had  been  rumbling  away  in  some  inner 
cavern,  and  had  come  out  in  an  echo. 

It  grew  late  when  the  man  sent  in  search  of 
a  vehicle  returned,  saying  that  nothing  was  to 
be  found.  The  missing  man  must  be  abandoned, 
and  we  must  push  on  as  we  could,  hoping,  on 
the  high  road,  to  fall  in  with  some  means  of 
transport.  The  two  troopers  gave  up  their 
horses  cheerfully  in  view  of  backsheesh,  the  two 
best  of  the  carriage-horses  bore  the  other  two 
of  us,  and  without  other  mishaps  we  journeyed 
along  as  far  as  the  road,  when  at  a  half-fortified 
metochi,  we  found  a  butcher's  cart,  which,  filled 
with  straw  and  packed  densely  with  the  four 
of  us,  in  addition  to  the  guide  and  driver,  served 
to  bring  us  with  much  pain  to  Athens,  where 


MARATHON  AND  ITS  BRIGANDS          39 

we  arrived  about  10  P.M.  The  missing  trooper 
was  waiting  at  the  metochi. 

The  next  day,  about  sunset,  I  happened  to 
meet  the  carriage  returning,  and  had  the  curi 
osity  to  ask  our  driver  what  was  the  matter. 

"Only  a  nail  which  had  got  between  the  axle 
and  wheel  and  would  not  let  it  turn." 

"Ah!"  I  said,  "how  did  the  nail  get  there?" 

The  driver  shrugged  his  shoulders  with  a  bland 
smile,  which  might  be  understood  to  mean  any 
thing  you  pleased.  /  took  it  to  mean  that  he 
knew  when  and  why  the  nail  got  in;  and,  had 
I  been  Stavros'  model  Minister,  I  should  certainly 
have  sent  him  to  the  Palamidi  forthwith. 


MY  EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK 
QUARANTINE 

HAVING  occasion  during  the  summer  of  1865  to 
go  from  Crete  to  European  terra-firma,  I  was 
obliged  to  go  to  Syra,  the  entrepot  of  the  Levant, 
to  take  passage  in  the  Austrian  Lloyd's  steamer; 
but  as  the  cholera  panic  and  the  restrictions  laid 
on  the  steamers  from  all  Turkish  ports  had  virtu 
ally  stopped  regular  communication  with  Greek 
ports,  I  took  a  passage  in  an  English  "Brixham 
schooner"  which  had  come  out  with  a  cargo  of 
soda,  etc.  Our  island  had  had  no  case  of  cholera, 
and  indeed  has  never  been  visited  by  it ;  its 
general  healthfulness  was  all  that  could  be  de 
sired  by  the  most  exacting  Board  of  Health,  and 
as,  moreover,  we  were  fortified  with  English, 
Turkish,  and  Greek  bills  of  health,  I  anticipated 
at  the  worst  a  detention  of  four  or  five  days 
previous  to  being  permitted  to  land. 

We  had  a  charming  run  of  thirty  odd  hours, 
with  just  wind  enough  to  make  a  landsman  love 
the  sea,  and  sighting  Syra  in  the  morning,  stood 
directly  in  for  the  port.  Half-a-mile  off  the 
mole-head  we  met  a  man-of-war's  boat,  the  Greek 
blue  and  white  stripes  flying  out  from  the  stern, 
and  received  a  most  peremptory  warning  to  go 
40 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    41 

no  nearer,  fearfully  shouted  from  a  safe  distance ; 
and  on  learning  that  we  were  from  a  Turkish 
port,  the  officer  ordered  us  off  to  Delos  for  eleven 
days'  quarantine,  not  daring  even  to  look  at  our 
bill  of  health  or  hear  any  protest  or  explanations. 
Those  who  have  been  at  Syra  may  remember 
to  the  west  of  that  port,  and  about  ten  miles 
away,  a  low,  bare,  and  rocky  island,  which  few 
people  ever  visit,  and  on  which  only  two  or 
three  herdsmen  live.  On  closer  inspection  one 
finds  that  what  seemed  to  be  one  is  really  two 
islands,  the  larger  called  sometimes  Rhenee,  and 
sometimes  the  greater  Delos,  the  smaller  the  true 
Delos,  site  of  the  famous  temple  of  Apollo.  In 
a  bay  on  the  south-eastern  side  of  the  former,  the 
schooner  cast  anchor,  and  the  so-called  lazaretto 
being  only  an  insignificant  collection  of  huts, 
built  of  rough  boards,  I  elected  to  perform 
quarantine  on  board.  In  fact,  the  bare,  dry,  even 
burnt  look  of  the  island,  without  a  shrub,  a 
spring,  or  a  living  thing  on  it  except  a  few 
guardiani  and  some  luckless  passengers  of  an 
English  steamer  which  had  preceded  us  by  a 
few  days,  gave  small  hope  of  being  able  to  pass 
eleven  days  of  idleness  endurably,  in  the  heat  of 
midsummer,  where  the  sun  is  as  fervent  as  it  is 
on  the  south  side  of  a  Greek  island.  The  steamer 
was  from  Alexandria,  with  over  two  hundred 
passengers  on  board,  mostly  Syriotes  and  other 
Greeks  flying  from  the  cholera,  then  in  the 
beginning  of  its  fury  at  that  city;  therefore  they 
were  most  naturally  put  into  quarantine.  Their 


42    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

term  was  fourteen  days,  I  believe,  of  which 
nearly  a  week  had  passed  without  any  symptoms 
of  sickness  of  any  kind.  We  were  near  enough 
to  hail  across  to  her  on  still  days  and  hear  the 
complaints  of  the  captain  roared  at  sympathetic 
ears  in  good  broad  English,  and  witness  by  eye 
and  ear  the  facts  I  am  about  to  narrate,  which 
I  challenge  the  most  patriotic  and  mendacious 
inhabitant  of  Syra  to  contradict. 

The  captain  of  the  steamer  having,  like  myself, 
only  calculated  on  a  few  days'  observation,  had 
provided  himself  with  sufficient  stores  for  the 
time  for  his  few  cabin  passengers,  the  great  bulk 
of  those  on  board  being  deck  passengers,  who 
provide  themselves  with  food  for  the  voyage. 
These  had  been  exhausted  soon  after  their  arrival 
at  quarantine;  and  the  captain,  praying  in  vain 
for  supplies  from  the  authorities  of  Syra,  began 
to  give  out  his  ship's  supplies;  for  it  was  impos 
sible,  as  he  said,  to  see  the  poor  people  starve. 
But  these  supplies,  abundant  for  his  proper  ends, 
would  go  but  a  little  way  in  feeding  that  hungry 
multitude,  and  were  threatened  with  exhaustion 
before  the  townspeople  should  awaken  their 
Christianity  from  its  sleep  of,  I  imagine,  about 
seventeen  centuries.  The  captain  appealed  in 
vain  to  them  to  save  their  countrymen  from 
starvation.  They  were  not  bound,  they  said,  to 
provide  food  for  people  because  they  found  them 
in  quarantine.  So  the  captain  gave  out  all  his 
stores,  little  by  little,  and  shouted  across  to  us  to 
know  if  we  had  any  to  spare.  The  Sylph  carried 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    43 

a  crew  of  five  men,  and  we  naturally  had  two 
or  three  barrels  of  hard  bread  and  salt  beef 
stowed  away  for  emergencies;  and  though  what 
we  could  give  them,  with  proper  regard  to  our 
own  needs,  could  be  little  more  than  a  few 
hours'  respite  from  starvation,  it  was  impossible 
to  withhold  it. 

The  captain  was  an  incarnate  protest,  a  deck- 
walking  imprecation  on  the  miserly  authorities 
of  Syra.  The  people  in  his  ship  were  not  his 
own  countrymen,  but  Greeks;  he  was  under  no 
obligation  to  provide  a  mouthful  for  one  of 
them;  they  had  no  money  to  buy,  and  he  had 
no  authority  to  buy  for  them  except  from  his 
own  funds — to  have  done  which  he  must  have 
been  a  Roman  prince  or  an  English  banker.  So 
he  wrote,  and  begged,  and  protested.  He  wrote 
to  the  English  consul,  Mr.  Lloyd,  and  Mr.  Lloyd 
stormed  at  the  nomarch  and  demarch  by  turns 
in  vain.  The  Syriotes  would  not  send,  and  the 
consul  could  not,  save  a  little  for  the  captain 
and  crew;  and  provisions  were  not  only  not 
supplied  by  the  Board  of  Health,  but  permission  to 
carry  them  off  to  the  steamer  was  denied  those 
who  would  have  taken  them,  so  great  was  the 
panic  at  the  idea  of  communication  with  the  ship. 
Mr.  Lloyd  succeeded  now  and  then  in  sending  a 
small  supply  by  the  guarda-costa,  and  they  bought 
now  and  then  a  kid  of  the  herdsmen  on  the 
"clean"  part  of  the  island,  at  exorbitant  rates. 
But  they,  too,  finally  refused  to  communicate ;  and 
then  the  captain  wrote  to  the  consul — I  saw  the 


44    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

letter  afterwards — "For  three  days  my  men  have 
had  no  bread,  and  two  of  them  have  gone 
raving  mad."  Amongst  the  cabin  passengers  was 
a  Frenchwoman,  pregnant  and  near  her  confine 
ment;  for  her  the  captain  begged  for  a  doctor 
or  nurse  in  vain — none  would  venture;  and  when 
the  time  was  come  the  poor  mother  had  only 
the  kindly  care  of  the  captain  and  her  fellow- 
passengers,  among  whom  was  no  woman  or 
person  competent  to  care  for  her.  Fortunately, 
she  passed  through  her  trial  safely. 

In  the  meanwhile,  Mr.  Lloyd  kept  up  his  pro 
tests  and  remonstrances  to  people  and  Govern 
ment — protested  against  the  inhumanity  and  the 
illegality  of  the  whole  thing — begged  for  relief  to 
deaf  ears :  "  Better,"  they  said,  "  that  a  few  should 
suffer  than  that  forty  thousand  should  incur 
the  peril  of  cholera.  To  allow  people  to  carry 
provisions  to  the  island  was  to  run  danger 
of  communication  with  contagion."  The  only 
reply  of  any  significance  that  Mr.  Lloyd  got  was 
a  threat  of  burning  his  house  over  his  head  if 
he  persisted  in  attempting  to  bring  cholera  into 
Syra. 

We,  faintly  realising  the  nature  of  this  little 
turmoil,  lay  quietly  under  the  intense  sun  waiting 
the  lapse  of  time.  The  Greeks  on  the  steamer 
might  starve,  but  we  were  perhaps  thankful  that 
they  were  only  Greeks;  we  should  wear  through 
well  enough,  and  then  be  free.  Mr.  Lloyd  finally 
wrote  to  Athens;  the  Government  at  Athens 
ordered  an  examination;  and  then  the  demos, 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    45 

under  compulsion,  voted  meagre  supplies  to  their 
famished  countrymen. 

But  our  fates  were  merciless.  A  few  days,  very 
few,  before  the  steamer's  time  had  expired,  a  ship 
arrived  from  Alexandria  which  actually  had  the 
cholera  on  board !  Twenty  or  more  had  died  and 
were  thrown  overboard  on  the  voyage,  as  we 
afterwards  learned,  and  several  more  were  sick. 
As  she  came  into  the  quarantine  anchoring-ground 
and  cast  anchor,  she  dragged  some  distance,  and 
seemed  in  a  fair  way  to  drift  against  the  armed 
cutter  which  was  doing  duty  as  guarda-costa  and 
capo-guardiano.  The  brave  captain — (I  hope  he 
wasn't  a  sailor) — ran  out  his  guns  and  prepared 
to  sink  the  ship  and  all  on  board,  lest  she  should 
come  into  contact  with  him.  That  scene  is  one 
I  shall  never  forget  and  hardly  ever  forgive:  the 
huddled  passengers  driven  on  deck  by  the  pesti 
lence  and  heat,  and,  doubtless,  already  in  a  frenzy 
of  fear  from  the  perils  within,  found  themselves 
met  on  the  threshold  of  deliverance  from  their 
awful  fellow-voyager  by  the  open  mouths  of  Greek 
carronades.  Women  shrieked  and  men  howled 
with  fright ;  all  prayed,  supplicating  the  gods  and 
the  captain.  The  guarda-costa  people  were  in  a 
worse  panic,  if  possible  —  shouted  orders  and 
counter-orders,  ran  out  a  gun  and  ran  it  in  again, 
threatened,  prayed  and  cursed,  as  though  doom 
was  on  them.  This  horror  of  the  cholera  seemed 
to  have  become  a  madness  in  the  Greek  mind. 
Our  sailors  gave  the  wretches  the  benefit  of  much 
good  and  strong  English,  which  I  fear  was  sadly 


46    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

wasted,  and  would  have  been  equally  so  had  it 
been  equally  good  Greek;  but  I  noticed  that  our 
guardiano  was  stricken  with  fear  at  the  bare  idea 
of  the  vicinity  of  the  infected  ship.  What  the 
extent  of  the  contagion  was  we  knew  not,  of 
course;  but  the  hurrying  and  trepidation  of  the 
people  on  board,  and  in  the  boat  which  came  along 
side,  made  it  evident  that  something  unusual  was 
going  on.  The  boat  lay  far  off,  and  the  officers 
shouted  very  loudly ;  and  we  heard  afterwards 
from  the  quarantine-boat  that  there  were  four 
or  five  dead  of  cholera  on  board,  whom  they 
wanted  to  send  on  shore  to  be  buried,  but  this 
was  refused  as  dangerous !  then  to  be  permitted 
to  sink  them  in  the  sea — this  was  still  less  to  be 
allowed.  They  begged  for  a  doctor — no  one  would 
go  :  guardiani  even  would  not  go  011  board  for  any 
compensation,  and  they  rowed  away,  leaving  her  to 
her  fate.  We  shortly  after  received  an  intimation 
that  by  reason  of  this  new  arrival  all  ships  in  quar 
antine  at  that  time  must  stay  fourteen  days  more ! 
My  own  wrath  at  Greek  inhumanity  had  been 
already  so  largely  excited  that  I  could  get  no 
angrier  at  this  new  tyranny — in  fact,  I  thought 
more  of  the  steamer  and  its  already  half-starved, 
and  even,  in  some  cases,  dying  people,  than  of 
myself;  and  if  I  had  had  the  pestilence  in  the 
hollow  of  my  hand,  I  should,  I  fear,  have  visited 
Syra  as  Egypt  never  was  visited.  But  the  most 
appalling  thought  was  of  that  luckless  ship  with 
Death  holding  revel  on  her,  and  the  living  bound 
to  the  dead. 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    47 

Here  was  the  ship  of  the  ancient  mariner,  in 
sooth — anchored  only,  but  with  anchors  almost 
useless  on  that  tranquil  sea,  the  fiery  sun  above, 
and  the  glassy  water  below,  and  nothing  to  break 
that  awful  monotony  but  the  merciless  quarantine- 
boat  coming  to  ask  and  refuse.  We  could  see  the 
people  on  the  ship  gather  on  the  forecastle  and  in 
the  rigging,  looking  out  to  the  land,  which,  brown 
and  dry  as  it  was,  was  to  them  a  refuge.  The 
second  and  the  third  day  came,  and  the  dead 
multiplied,  until  ten  or  a  dozen  corpses  were  on 
board.  Still  no  physician,  no  landing,  no  burial 
even ;  and  the  plague-stricken  ship  and  its  dying 
cargo  lay  still  under  the  August  sun.  The  third 
day  the  crew  received  permission  to  put  the  bodies 
overboard,  tied  with  ropes,  that  they  might  not 
drift  away  and  carry  to  some  accursed  Greek  com 
munity  the  plague  it  merited.  I  may  be  unjust, 
but  those  days  have  made  me  detest  and  abhor 
the  very  name  of  Syra  and  its  people.  We  saw  the 
dead  lowered  overboard,  one  by  one,  and  with 
glasses  could  see  them  floating  alongside,  horrible 
to  sight  and  fancy. 

I  am  only  dealing  with  facts — facts  which  will 
be  confirmed  by  the  testimony  of  many  who 
passed  those  broiling  August  days  in  that  quaran 
tine.  No  physician  could  be  found  in  Syra  who 
had  humanity  enough  to  hear  the  cry  of  that 
suffering  company,  or  venture  on  the  plague- 
stricken  ship.  They  latterly  got  permission  to 
bury  the  dead,  all  but  one  mother  and  child,  who 
drifted  loose,  and  were  cast  on  some  unknown 


48    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

shore,  or  fed  the  fishes ;  subsequently  a  Danish 
physician  came,  a  volunteer  from — I  regret  to  say 
I  know  not  where,  nor  even  do  I  know  his  name. 
I  did  not  think  then  to  enable  myself  to  render 
him  the  honour  he  deserves;  and  finally  the  sick 
were  landed.  There  had  been  a  hundred  and  forty 
passengers  on  board  when  the  ship  left  Alexandria, 
and  there  were  over  a  hundred  when  she  came  to 
quarantine  —  the  untouched  remaining  on  board 
until  they  were  attacked  in  their  turn,  and  were 
carried  ashore  to  die.  Their  provisions,  too,  were 
failing,  and  at  last  starvation  came  to  help  the 
pestilence. 

I  sought  distraction  and  pastime  amongst  the 
sailors,  of  whom  two  had  attracted  my  attention 
during  the  run  over.  One  of  them  I  judged  to  be 
an  American  at  first  sight,  the  incarnation  of  "  go- 
a-head"  and  nervous  energy.  I  had  seen  him  at 
the  wheel  the  first  day  out,  as  I  sat  aft  taking  my 
fruit  after  dinner,  and  tempted  him  to  affability 
by  a  huge  slice  of  melon,  which  he  ate  without 
ever  taking  his  eye  for  more  than  an  instant  from 
the  course  of  the  schooner.  The  next  day  they 
were  apples  that  broke  the  silence  ;  when,  abruptly 
turning  round  to  me,  he  asked  if  I  was  a  free 
mason.  He  was,  and  evidently  did  not  understand 
how  one  could  treat  a  sailor  with  courtesy  or  kind 
ness  without  some  such  motive  as  that  mystic 
brotherhood  is  supposed  to  furnish.  He  wore  a 
black  wide-awake  crowded  close  down  to  his  eyes, 
which  looked  sharp  out  from  under  black,  clear- 
drawn  eyebrows.  His  nose  was  prominent,  pointed, 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    49 

and  straight,  and  his  mouth  full  of  decision;  lips 
close-pressed,  and  chin  small  and  slightly  retreat 
ing.  He  carried  his  head  habitually  a  little  for 
ward,  as  if  on  the  look-out,  and  reminded  me  in 
his  ensemble  more  of  a  clipper  than  anything  I 
ever  saw  in  flesh.  He  was  taciturn,  however,  and 
absolutely  refused  to  talk  of  himself.  The  other, 
who  responded  to  the  name  of  Bill,  was  certainly 
one  of  the  best  examples  of  the  English  sailor  I 
have  ever  met — robust,  thick-set,  with  large  brain 
and  full  beard,  a  frank  blue  eye,  and  an  off-hand 
manner  familiar  to  all  who  permitted  it,  but  re 
spectful  to  the  highest  degree,  and  speaking  the 
English  of  a  man  who  had  had  some  education. 
In  the  first  days  of  our  imprisonment  he  had  sur 
prised  me  not  a  little  by  offering  to  lend  me  some 
old  numbers  of  reviews  and  magazines,  written 
on  the  margins  of  which  I  found  some  shrewd 
comments,  and  with  some  bits  of  drawing.  I  am 
not  going  to  write  his  story,  and  shall  not  repeat 
what  I  learned  of  a  life  ruined  by  an  uncontrol 
lable  spirit  of  adventure  and  unimproved  oppor 
tunities  ;  I  have  only  to  do  with  him  now  as  he 
wove  himself  into  the  web  of  our  quarantine 
life. 

It  was  from  Bill  that  I  learned  what  I  first 
knew  of  Aleck;  that  he  was,  as  I  supposed,  an 
American,  had  been  in  the  Confederate  service, 
and  had  even  served  on  the  Alabama.  After 
finding  out  so  much,  I  tried  hard  to  make  him 
talk  about  himself,  but  in  vain.  He  was  respect 
ful,  but  not  communicative  on  any  subject,  and 

D 


50    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

least  so  on  himself.     But  the  new  excitement  of 
the  cholera-ship  and  its  horrors  made  a  certain 
difference.    I  certainly  felt  more  like  getting  near 
my  fellow-men,  and    they,   and    especially  Aleck, 
were  more   oblivious    of    the    difference    between 
them  and  me.    The  immediate  cause  of  the  break 
ing  of  the  ice  was  the  sight  of    a  poor  woman 
standing  on  the  poop  of  the  cholera-ship  as  she 
swung  towards  us  from  her  anchorage,  before  a 
slight    easterly    air,    that    brought    the    woman's 
voice  down  to  us  in  supplications  which  we  could 
from  time  to  time  partially  distinguish,  and  which 
were    for    bread,    bread,    bread!     We    could    see 
others  on  board  climbing  on  the  bulwarks,  stand 
ing  on  the  poop   or  forecastle,  according  to   the 
end  of  the  ship  which  drifted  nearest  us;  but  we 
could  hear  no   other    voice,  though    we    doubted 
not  that    many  were   joined  with    hers.      Beside 
her  we  saw,  later,  another  female  figure,  whom, 
by  the  aid  of  the  glass,  I  believed  I  could  make 
out    to    be    her    daughter.     The    latter   made  no 
sound  that  we  could  hear,  but  sat  mutely  or  stood 
with  her  arm  around  the  other,  while  ever  and 
anon  we   heard  that  heartrending   cry,    "Psomil 
psomi ! "   (bread  !  bread !).    At  sunset  that  day  we 
were  all  together  on  the  forecastle,  better  friends 
through  our  common  pity.     We  proposed  to  our 
taciturn  guardiano  to  send  some  bread  on  board 
the  ship,  but  he  absolutely  refused  to  lend  himself 
to  any  such  risk  of  contagion,  and  forbade  any 
attempt  to  communicate  either  with  the  ship  or 
the  shore  where  the  sick  were;   and,  to  tell  the 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    51 

truth,  it  was  not  pleasant  to  contemplate  the 
chances  of  being  put  in  quarantine  for  an  addi 
tional  indefinite  term,  for  having,  even  in  a  kindly 
work,  come  in  real  or  fancied  contact  with  the 
disease.  But  as  the  authority  of  the  guardiano 
was  absolute,  we  could  do  nothing  in  the  matter 
openly,  though  it  was  determined  in  council  by 
us  three  to  do  something  in  some  way,  if  relief 
was  not  brought  soon. 

From  the  forecastle  next  morning  we  saw  in 
the  early  light  the  two  hapless  creatures  in  the 
same  position.  Bill,  looking  over  into  the  water 
thoughtfully,  asked  if  there  were  many  sharks  in 
those  waters.  I  replied  that  I  had  never  seen  but 
one,  inquiring  why  he  asked.  "Why,"  said  he, 
"I  think  I  could  get  some  grub  over  to  those 
women  if  you  could  manage  the  guardiano"  "It 
isn't  much  of  a  swim,"  I  replied,  "  but  as  to  carry 
ing  the  prog,  you  will  find  that  more  difficult." 
"Well,"  said  he,  "I  have  carried  a  pretty  good 
load  in  the  water  before  now,  and  can  float  enough 
to  keep  those  women  from  starving.  I  lived  in  the 
Sandwich  Islands  once,  and  though  I  don't  stand 
out  of  the  water  like  a  Kanaka,  I  have  carried 
my  clothes  on  my  head  many  a  mile  without 
wetting  them,  and  a  few  pounds  of  bread  won't 
sink  me."  Here  his  eye  twinkled  as  if  he  had  a 
story  to  tell,  and  I  waited  for  it.  "I  commanded 
a  lorcha  transport  during  the  last  war  in  China," 
he  began,  after  a  moment,  "and  one  day,  while 
we  were  in  Canton,  I  was  walking  through  one 
of  the  streets  with  my  mate,  an  Englishman, 


52    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

and  we  stopped  to  look  in  a  joss-house.  There 
was  a  joss  there  of  pure  silver,  about  fourteen 
inches  high,  and  I  made  up  my  mind  to  have 
him.  We  two  were  the  only  Europeans  on  board, 
and  the  first  dark  stormy  night  we  took  the  boat 
and  went  ashore  well  armed.  The  joss-house  had 
no  guard  but  the  priests,  and  the  night  was  so 
bad  that  we  broke  the  door  down  and  got  in 
without  the  outsiders  knowing  it,  and  carried 
the  joss  off  easily  enough;  but  the  next  day  we 
had  row  enough  to  pay  for  it.  Every  vessel  in 
the  river  was  searched,  and  if  I  had  had  him  on 
board  he  would  have  been  found  and  we  should 
have  caught  it,  for  the  officers  were  in  earnest 
about  it,  and  the  Chinese  in  a  fury.  I  knew 

there  would  be  the  d 1  to  pay  in  the  morning, 

so  I  put  a  cord  around  his  neck,  and  went  down 
and  hung  him  to  the  lower  pintle  of  the  rudder, 
and  left  him  there  till  the  hue-and-cry  was  over, 
and  then  brought  him  up.  He  weighed  forty-two 
pounds.  I  think  I  could  do  more  in  this  case 
than  then."  "Do  it  then,"  said  I;  "I'll  help  you 
all  I  can:  but  we  won't  let  the  captain  or  any 
of  the  men  know  of  it!"  "Oh,  I'll  put  that  all 
right,"  said  Aleck.  "Jones  has  the  first  watch 
to-night,  and  I  '11  change  with  him ;  and  as  for  the 
guardiano,  he's  a  sleepy  cuss,  and  I  reckon  won't 
give  himself  the  trouble  to  look  on  deck  after 
he  turns  in — he  never  has,  any  way ;  and  if  you  'd 
like  to  keep  watch  with  me,  sir,  I  think  we  can 
manage  it."  "But,  Bill,"  I  added,  "look  out  for 
the  guarda-costa :  if  they  see  anything  in  the 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    53 

water  moving  between  the  vessels,  they'll  fire  at 
it,  certainly."  "That  won't  trouble  me,"  replied 
the  imperturbable  tar.  "  I  have  run  the  blockade 
in  the  American  war  thirteen  times,  and  had 
bigger  balls  than  that  fellow  can  throw  whizzing 
about  my  head,  and  fired  by  better  gunners  than 
they  have  got  aboard  there.  Why,  sir,  we  ran 
almost  into  one  of  their  Monitors  one  night,  and 
had  eight  15-inch  shot  fired  at  us  without  being 
hit;  and  in  all  the  thirteen  trips  in  and  out  we 
never  were  hit  but  once,  and  then  the  ball  only 
took  off  the  head  of  the  look-out  forward." 

And  so  we  arranged  it  that  Bill  should  swim  off 
to  the  ship  as  soon  as  it  was  dark,  and  trusting 
to  fortune  to  get  the  provisions  aboard  without 
discovery,  we  were  to  hang  overboard  a  light  for 
him  to  swim  back  to. 

"That  ship  reminds  me,"  said  Bill,  after  a  long 
pause,  "of  a  trip  I  made  once  in  an  English  ship 
to  Senegal.  We  went  up  the  river  to  load,  and 
while  we  lay  there  waiting  for  cargo  to  come 
down,  we  had  one  of  the  worst  yellow  fevers 
break  out  on  the  ship  I  ever  saw.  The  first  man 
who  was  taken  with  it  died  in  three  hours, 
and  that  day  two  more  were  taken  and  died 
before  dark,  and  in  three  days  we  lost  all  but 
seven  of  the  crew,  one  after  the  other — not  one 
was  sick  more  than  six  hours — and  then  the  mate 
was  taken  sick.  The  first  thing  I  knew  of  it  was 
that  he  said  to  me,  'Bill,  give  me  a  good  glass 
of  grog,  and  fill  my  pipe ;  I  want  one  good  smoke 
and  a  drink  before  I  die.'  '  Oh,  nonsense,'  says  I, 


54    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

'you  are  no  more  likely  to  die  than  I  am.'  'I 
know  very  well  I  have  got  it,'  said  he ;  '  and  when 
I  am  dead  bury  me  deep  enough  so  that  the  land 
crabs  can't  dig  me  up.'  Sure  enough  he  died  that 
afternoon,  and  we  took  him  ashore  before  night 
and  buried  him  in  a  good  deep  grave.  In  two 
days  more  there  were  only  the  captain  and  I 
alive  on  the  ship.  And  there  we  lay  ten  days 
till  we  heard  that  an  English  man-of-war  was 
off  the  mouth  of  the  river,  and  the  captain  sent 
a  native  boat  down  to  ask  him  to  send  up  men  to 
work  the  ship  out  of  the  river.  The  man-of-war 
sent  word  that  they  wouldn't  send  men  up  the 
river,  but  if  we  could  work  her  down  with  natives, 
they  would  give  us  men  to  get  the  ship  home  to 
England,  and  so  we  got  out,  but  a  deuce  of  a  time 
we  had  of  it  getting  down.  I  suppose  they  feel 
on  that  ship  pretty  much  as  I  did  those  ten  days." 
All  day  long  we  heard  at  intervals  that  pitiful 
cry,  "Bread!  bread!"  faintly  coming  over  the 
water.  It  was  more  tolerable  than  the  day 
before,  because  we  knew  that  relief  would  go 
with  nightfall.  And  so,  as  the  dark  came,  we 
made  up  a  packet  of  hard  bread  with  a  little 
cold  meat  and  a  bottle  of  wine,  and  binding  it 
securely  between  Bill's  shoulders,  and  with  a 
pointed  stick  on  top  of  it,  in  case,  as  he  said,  "a 
shark  should  want  to  take  the  prog  from  him," 
he  slipped  down  into  the  water,  stripped  to  his 
drawers,  and  struck  out  for  the  cholera-ship  so 
quietly  that  you  might  have  thought  it  a  little 
school  of  guard-fish. 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    55 

We  sat  on  the  forecastle  watching  and  waiting. 
I  said  nothing,  and  where  two  are  together  and 
one  will  not  talk,  the  other  sometimes  will.  Aleck 
finally  broke  silence  with — "Women  are  mighty 
curious  things.  I'll  bet  that  old  one  don't  touch 
a  mouthful  till  t'other  has  eaten,  and  I  don't 
believe  she  would  have  made  half  the  fuss  she 
did  if  she  had  been  alone.  In  the  beginning  of 
the  American  war  I  belonged  to  a  regiment  of 
mounted  riflemen,  and  we  were  sent  into  Eastern 
Tennessee,  where  there  was  a  good  deal  of  bush 
whacking  about  that  time.  We  were  picketed 
one  day  in  a  line  about  two  miles  long  across 
country,  and  I  was  on  the  extreme  left.  I  took 
my  saddle  off,  holsters  and  all,  and  hung  it  on 
a  branch  of  a  peach-tree,  and  my  carbine  on 
another.  We  knew  there  were  no  Yankees  near, 
and  so  I  was  kind  o'  off  guard,  eating  peaches. 
By-and-by  I  saw  a  young  woman  coming  down 
to  where  I  was,  on  horseback.  She  wanted  to 
know  if  there  were  many  of  the  boys  near,  and 
if  they  would  buy  some  milk  of  her  if  she  took 
it  down  to  them.  I  said  I  thought  they  would, 
and  took  about  a  quart  myself ;  and  as  she  hadn't 
much  more,  I  emptied  the  water  out  of  my  canteen 
and  took  the  rest.  Says  she,  'If  you'll  come  up 
to  the  house  yonder,  I've  got  something  better 
than  that :  you  may  have  some  good  peach  brandy 
— some  of  your  fellows  might  like  a  little.'  I  said 
I'd  go,  and  she  says,  'You  needn't  take  your 
saddle  or  carbine,  it's  just  a  step,  and  they  are 
safe  enough  here — there's  nobody  about.'  So  I 


56    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

mounted  bareback,  and  she  led  the  way.  When 
we  passed  the  bars  where  she  came  in,  she  says, 
'  You  ride  on  a  step,  and  I  '11  get  down  and  put  up 
the  bars.'  I  went  on,  and  as  she  came  up  behind, 
she  says  pretty  sharp,  'Ride  a  little  faster,  if  you 
please.'  I  looked  round,  and  she  had  a  revolver 
pointed  straight  at  my  head,  and  I  saw  that  she 
knew  how  to  use  it.  I  had  left  everything  behind 
me  like  a  fool,  and  had  to  give  in  and  obey  orders. 
'That's  the  house,  if  you  please,'  she  says,  and 
showed  me  a  house  in  the  edge  of  the  woods  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  away.  We  got  there,  and  she 
told  me  to  get  down  and  eat  something,  for  she 
was  going  to  give  me  a  long  ride — into  the  Yankee 
lines,  about  twenty  miles  away.  Her  father  came 
out  and  abused  me  like  a  thief,  and  told  me  that 
he  was  going  to  have  me  sent  into  the  Federal 
lines  to  be  hung.  It  seems  he  had  had  a  son 
hung  the  week  before  by  some  of  the  Confeder 
ates,  and  was  going  to  have  his  revenge  out  of 
me.  I  ate  pretty  well,  for  I  thought  I  might  need 
it  before  I  got  any  more,  and  then  the  old  fellow 
began  to  curse  me  and  abuse  me  like  anything. 
He  said  he  would  shoot  me  on  the  spot  if  it 
wasn't  that  he'd  rather  have  me  hung;  and  in 
stead  of  giving  me  my  own  horse,  he  took  the 
worst  one  he  had  in  his  stables,  and  they  put 
me  on  that  with  my  feet  tied  together  under 
his  belly.  Luckily  they  didn't  tie  my  hands,  for 
they  thought  I  had  no  arms,  and  couldn't  help 
myself;  but  I  always  carried  a  small  revolver 
in  my  shirt  bosom.  The  girl  kept  too  sharp 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    57 

watch  on  me  for  me  to  use  it.  She  never  turned 
her  revolver  from  me,  and  I  knew  that  the  first 
suspicious  move  I  made  I  was  a  dead  man.  We 
went  about  ten  miles  in  this  way,  when  my 
old  crow-bait  gave  out  and  wouldn't  go  any 
farther.  She  wouldn't  trust  me  afoot,  and  so 
had  to  give  up  her  own  horse,  but  she  kept 
the  bridle  in  her  own  hands,  and  walked  ahead 
with  one  eye  turned  back  on  me,  and  the  revolver 
cocked  with  her  finger  on  the  trigger,  so  that  I 
never  had  a  chance  to  put  my  hand  in  my  bosom. 
We  finally  came  to  a  spring,  and  she  asked  me 
if  I  wanted  to  drink:  I  didn't  feel  much  like 
drinking,  but  I  said  yes,  and  so  she  let  me  down. 
I  put  my  head  down  to  the  water,  and  at  the 
same  time  put  my  hand  down  where  the  revolver 
was,  and  pulled  it  forward  where  I  could  put  my 
hand  on  it  easily ;  but  she  was  on  the  watch  and 
I  couldn't  pull  it  out.  I  mounted  again,  and  the 
first  time  she  was  off  her  guard  a  little  I  fired, 
and  broke  the  arm  she  held  the  pistol  in.  'Now,' 
says  I,  'it's  my  turn:  you'll  please  get  on  that 
horse  and  we  '11  go  back.'  She  didn't  flinch  or  say 
a  word,  but  got  on  the  horse,  and  I  tied  her  legs 
as  they  had  mine,  and  we  went  back  to  the 
house.  The  old  man  he  heard  us  come  up  to 
the  door  and  looked  out  of  the  window.  He 
turned  as  pale  as  a  sheet  and  ran  for  his  rifle. 
I  knew  what  he  was  after,  and  pushed  the  door 
in  before  he  was  loaded.  Says  I,  'You  may  put 
that  shooting-iron  down  and  come  with  me.'  He 
wasn't  as  brave  as  the  girl,  but  it  was  no  use  to 


58    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

resist,  and  he  knew  it ;  so  he  came  along.  About 
half-way  back  we  met  some  of  our  fellows  who 
had  missed  me,  and  come  out  to  look  me  up. 

They    took    them    both,    and "     He  paused    a 

moment,  and  lowering  his  tone,  added,  "  I  don't 
know  what  they  did  with  them,  but  I  know 

d well  what  they  would  have  done  with  me." 

I  replied,  after  a  pause,  "I  suppose  they  hanged 
them  both?"  Aleck  nodded  his  head  without 
looking  up,  and  seemed  anxious  to  drop  the 
subject. 

"But,"  said  I,  rather  disposed  to  work  the  vein 
of  communicativeness,  but  not  anxious  to  hear 
any  more  such  adventures,  "I  thought  you  had 
been  in  the  Confederate  navy?"  "I  was,"  said 
Aleck.  "  I  was  with  Semmes  everywhere  he  went ; 
I  was  in  the  naval  brigade  and  blockade-running, 
and  on  the  Alabama  all  the  while  he  commanded 
her."  "  But  not  when  she  sank,  I  suppose  ? "  I 
rejoined.  "  Well,  I  was,  and  was  picked  up  with 
him  by  the  Deerhound"  "It  was  a  pretty  sharp 
fight,  wasn't  it  ?  "  I  suggestingly  asked.  "  It  was 
that,"  replied  Aleck,  but  he  didn't  care  about 
enlarging.  "  I  suppose  it  was  the  eleven-inch 
shells  that  did  her  business?"  "Oh,  no,"  said 
he,  coming  to  a  kind  of  confessional,  "we 
never  had  any  chance;  we  had  no  gunners  to 
compare  with  the  Kearsages.  Our  gunners  fired 
by  routine,  and  when  they  had  the  gun  loaded, 
fired  it  off  blind.  They  never  changed  the  eleva 
tion  of  their  guns  all  the  fight,  and  the  Kearsage 
was  working  up  to  us  all  the  while,  taking 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    59 

advantage  of  every  time  she  was  hid  by  smoke 
to  work  a  little  nearer,  and  then  her  gunners 
took  aim  for  every  shot."  "Then  it  isn't  true 
that  the  Alabama  tried  to  board  the  Kearsage?" 
"No,  sir;  she  did  her  best  to  get  away  from  her 
from  the  time  the  fight  commenced:  we  knew 
well  that  if  we  got  in  range  of  her  Dahlgren 
howitzers  she  would  sink  us  in  ten  minutes." 
"But,"  I  asked,  "don't  you  believe  that  Semmes 
supposed  he  would  whip  the  Kearsage  when  he 
went  out  to  fight  her?"  "No:  he  was  bullied 
into  it,  and  took  good  care  to  leave  all  his 
valuables  on  shore,  and  had  a  life-preserver  on 
through  the  fight.  I  saw  him  put  it  on,  and 
I  thought  if  it  was  wise  in  him  it  wouldn't  be 
foolish  in  me,  and  I  put  one  on  too.  When 
Semmes  saw  that  the  ship  was  going  down,  he 
told  us  all  to  swim  who  could,  and  was  one  of 
the  first  to  jump  into  the  water,  and  we  all 
made  for  the  Deerhound.  I  was  a  long  way 
ahead  of  Semmes,  and  when  I  came  up  to  the 
Deerhounds  boat  they  asked  me  if  I  was  Semmes 
before  they  would  take  me  in.  I  said  I  wasn't, 
and  then  they  asked  me  what  I  was  on  the 
Alabama.  Said  I,  'No  matter  what  I  was  on 
the  Alabama,  I  shall  be  a  dead  man  soon  if 
you  don't  take  me  in.'  They  asked  me  again 
if  I  was  an  officer  or  a  seaman,  and  wouldn't 
take  me  in  until  I  told  them  that  I  was  an 
officer."  "But,"  said  I,  "did  they  actually  refuse 
to  pick  up  common  seamen,  and  leave  them  to 
drown  ? "  "  They  did  that,"  replied  he  wrath- 


60    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

fully,  "  and  as  soon  as  they  had  Semmes  on  board 
they  made  tracks  as  fast  as  they  knew  how, 
and  left  everybody  else  to  drown  or  be  picked 
up  by  the  Kearsage" 

"  Time  to  show  the  light,  I  reckon,"  said  Aleck, 
after  his  ebullition  had  subsided,  and  proceeded 
to  put  over  the  bows  the  light  agreed  on.  Half- 
an-hour  after  Bill  had  started  on  his  voyage  we 
heard  his  whistle  from  below  the  forechains,  and 
heaving  him  a  line  brought  him  in  cautiously. 
He  slipped  down  to  change  his  clothing  and  add 
to  it,  and  then  came  up  to  render  an  account 
of  his  doings.  He  had,  as  he  anticipated,  found 
more  difficulty  in  getting  on  board  the  ship  than 
in  getting  to  it.  He  had  found  the  poor  women 
on  the  quarter-deck  —  all  order  and  shipkeeping 
abandoned,  and  no  look-out  anywhere.  The  pas 
sengers  were  sleeping  on  deck  or  sitting  around 
it,  moaning  and  weeping.  He  dared  not  call  to 
the  women  for  fear  of  disturbing  the  guardiani 
and  of  attracting  the  attention  of  the  other  pas 
sengers,  to  whom  his  small  supply  would  have 
been  but  a  mouthful.  He  swam  round  and  round 
looking  for  a  loose  rope's-end  in  vain,  and  finally 
did  what  we  should  have  supposed  certain  to 
lead  to  his  discovery  —  climbed  up  the  cable  and 
over  the  bows,  throwing  over  his  shoulders  the 
first  garment  he  found  on  the  disorderly  deck, 
and  slowly  walked  the  whole  length  of  the  ship : 
when,  having  deposited  the  provisions  at  the  side 
of  the  unfortunate  ones,  signifying  that  they 
were  to  inform  no  one  and  keep  them  to  them- 


EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE    61 

selves,  as  well  as  his  few  words  of  Greek  would 
let  him,  he  dropped  overboard  by  a  line  from 
the  quarter,  and  leaving  them  in  mute  and 
motionless  wonder,  came  back  as  quietly  as  he 
had  gone.  Bill  couldn't  resist  the  temptation 
next  morning  of  waving  a  big  white  cloth  at 
the  ship,  a  signal  which  attracted  the  immediate 
attention  and  suspicion  of  our  watchful  guardi- 
ano,  who,  with  an  effervescence  of  useless  Greek, 
delivered  his  mind  on  the  subject  of  contumacia 
and  communication,  at  which  we  all  laughed: 
we  felt  merrier  that  morning  than  for  many 
days  past. 

In  fact,  though  we  saw  for  several  days  more 
the  boat  going  back  and  forwards  from  the  ship 
to  the  shore,  and  knew  that  they  went  to  bury 
the  dead,  could  see  them  buried  even  with  our 
glasses,  we  never  felt  so  oppressed  by  the  horror 
of  it  since  Bill's  chivalric  swim.  We  finished 
without  other  incident  our  appointed  two  weeks, 
and  had  soon  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that 
public  clamour  had  obliged  Syra  to  recognise  the 
claims  of  humanity,  and  send  food  to  the  starving. 

We  had  to  undergo  a  five  days'  "  observation " 
behind  the  lighthouse  island  off  the  port,  in 
company  with  the  English  steamer,  which  was, 
moreover,  threatened  with  a  third  fortnight; 
which  she  escaped  only  by  the  energetic  remon 
strances  of  the  British  consul,  backed  up  by  the 
Legation  at  Athens,  who  persuaded  the  central 
government  to  send  orders  to  Syra  that  the 
steamer  should  be  admitted  to  pratique.  A  Greek 


62    EXPERIENCE  IN  A  GREEK  QUARANTINE 

man-of-war  was  accordingly  sent  from  the  Piraeus 
to  Syra  with  a  commission  to  ascertain  the  truth 
of  the  complaints  of  Mr.  Lloyd,  and  finding  them 
well  -  founded,  ordered  the  admittance  of  the 
steamer  to  pratique;  but  so  great  was  the  terror 
of  the  population  and  the  timidity  of  the  com 
mission,  that  the  latter  ceded  to  the  threats  of 
a  revolution,  and  compromised  on  admitting  the 
passengers  to  the  lazaretto  of  Syra  and  sending 
the  ship  away.  If  all  these  things  are  not 
recorded  in  the  chronicles  of  that  city,  they  are 
in  the  minds  of  many  who  were  martyrs  to  the 
inhuman  cowardice  of  Syra,  and  who  will  bear 
me  testimony  that  every  occurrence  of  which  public 
recognition  could  be  taken  in  the  above  narrative  is 
strictly  true.  As  for  the  yarns,  I  tell  them,  as 
nearly  as  I  can  remember,  as  they  were  told 
me,  and — believe  them. 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

WHAT  survives  of  the  seven  wonders  of  the 
world  may  mainly  be  seen  in  London,  itself  the 
eighth  and  greatest,  not  only  for  what  of  the 
Old  World  and  older  times  it  holds,  but  for  the 
living,  growing  marvel  that  it  is,  the  highest 
achievement  of  the  agglomerating  human  spirit. 
With  all  the  years  I  have  known  it,  and  the 
times  I  have  been  in  and  out  of  it,  I  find  at 
every  return  that  I  scarcely  know  how  great 
it  is,  or  realise  how  wise  and  how  wicked,  how 
noble  and  how  stolid.  Mighty  and  wealthy 
beyond  any  dreams  of  Arabian  Nights;  wrapping 
in  its  tortuous  folds  all  extremes  of  human 
existence;  by  turns,  a  city  of  palaces,  and  the 
nest  of  the  highest  and  divinest  human  impulse, 
and  the  smoke-blackened,  fog-wrapped,  dingy, 
gloomy  capital  of  Cimmeria ;  plague  latent  in  its 
alleys,  and  utter  destitution  driving  their  people 
to  death  and  all  degradation  in  clouds  like  the 
flies  that  perish — it  seems  the  very  focus  of 
life-and-death  ferment,  quickening  and  releasing 
at  once  what  is  divinest  and  most  infernal  in 
the  human  heart,  and  ripening  both  as  no  other 
city  built  by  human  hands  has  done. 

Visit    it  for  the  first    time  from  the    south,  if 
possible,  in  the  autumn,  and  towards  the  close  of 

63 


64  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

day,  when  the  grey  incertitude  lies  on  the 
mighty  city.  You  will  have  come  through  the 
lovely  country  of  Kent,  Hampshire,  and  Surrey, 
— garden  of  England, — the  little  compact  villages 
twinkling  by  the  railway  side,  the  ever-green 
fields  chasing  the  parks,  and  the  parks  following 
the  downs,  in  an  unbroken  succession  of  lovely 
landscapes;  then  the  villages  come  closer  to 
gether,  and  you  see  the  houses  begin  to  lose 
their  pagan  aspect  and  grow  up  storeys  higher — 
villas  —  suburb  houses,  miles  of  suburbs  with 
intervals  yet  to  become  city;  and  then  you 
come  on  the  outskirts  of  the  world's  metropolis, 
no  longer  suburbs  pushing  off  for  better  air, 
but  low,  dingy  haunts  of  labour  and  poverty, 
packed  and  involved  in  economic  leaseholds  on 
earth's  surface  —  scarcely  more  than  graveyard 
room.  You  look  down  into  the  streets  —  into 
the  windows,  down  chimney-pots  even;  and  the 
din  of  unnumbered  streets,  the  smoke  of  myriad 
chimneys,  and  the  twinkle  of  lamps  as  the 
very  stars  of  heaven  for  their  multitude,  come 
up  to  you  whirling  along  dizzily  above  it  all. 
You  hear  the  hum  of  the  world  below  you, 
and,  as  far  as  the  eye  can  catch  the  gleam  of 
gas-light  through  the  space  around,  there  is  an 
unbroken,  endless  wilderness  of  houses.  Wider 
streets  yawn  and  send  up  a  sudden,  stronger 
pulsation  of  sound,  but  no  change  beyond. 
Lights  burn  dimmer,  smoke  grows  denser,  the 
indefinite  grows  more  and  more  indefinite. 
You  wonder  what  would  happen  if  a  broken 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  65 

rail  should  send  your  train  off  that  line  of 
arches  which  overstretches  London — the  high 
way  of  the  age  of  mechanism  bringing  you 
into  the  capital  and  working  centre  of  the 
modern  mechanical  system;  and  while  you 
wonder  still,  your  train  flashes  out  as  into  mid 
air,  and  you  see  on  both  sides  a  grey  and  hazy 
tide,  twinkling  with  wavy  lights  and  spanned 
with  bridges,  either  vista  ending  in  mystery. 
This  is  Father  Thames;  after  the  Tiber,  greatest 
of  rivers.  Here  the  history  of  modern  civilisa 
tion  centres ;  and  from  Caesar  to  William  of 
Orange  the  possession  of  this  water-course  has 
been  a  main  motive  in  struggles  which  have 
widened,  deepened,  and  established  human  rights 
and  wise  government  more  than  those  of  all 
other  civilised  countries  in  the  same  epoch. 
For  the  Thames  made  London,  and  the  salt 
sea  which  ebbs  and  flows  at  its  doors  has  kept 
alive  liberty  and  prosperity  through  disasters 
which  would  have  destroyed  an  inland  town 
many  times;  and  that  municipal  independence, 
which  has  never  failed  London,  is  the  source 
of  all  that  is  healthiest  and  most  nobly  con 
servative  in  our  modern  political  organisation. 

As  the  river  vanishes  from  sight,  your  train 
slows  within  the  vast  and  mysterious  structure, 
last  creation  of  architecture,  where  sight  and 
hearing  are  alike  confounded;  calls  and  cries, 
whistles  and  bells,  a  score  of  locomotives  coming 
and  going,  trains  entering  and  trains  departing, 
a  ceaseless  flood  and  ebb  of  passengers,  be- 

E 


66  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

wildering,  confusing  to  every  sense  but  their 
own,  yet  each  ticketed  to  his  destination  and 
surely  directed  to  his  train.  The  system,  the 
consummate  order  with  which  the  demands  of 
a  commerce  so  vast  are  met  and  satisfied,  the 
comparative  quiet,  the  want  of  bustle  and  fussi- 
ness,  impress  the  American  more  than  anything 
else  in  this  first  impression  of  London.  One 
can  but  recall  the  Romans,  the  great  builders 
and  organisers,  the  masters  of  all  good  system 
of  civic  things  in  the  old  time  as  these  are  in 
our  day. 

This  is  the  side  of  English  character  which 
imposes  on  me,  compels  me  to  a  deference  and 
respect  which  deepen  as  I  know  the  more  of  it. 
In  taste,  they  are  barbarians ;  in  the  application 
of  the  principles  of  political  or  social  science 
they  are  arribr6s  and  too  tenaciously  conserva 
tive;  but  they  build  better  than  they  know,  by 
an  intuition ;  and  the  gravitation  of  the  national 
character  is,  in  spite  of  their  prejudices  against 
progress,  carrying  them  to  the  best  and  safest 
form  of  civilisation — that  based  on  an  inborn 
morality,  love  of  justice,  and  respect  for  human 
rights.  It  seems  strange,  looking  at  the  history 
of  England — at  her  imperial  policy  of  to-day, 
at  such  huge  violations  of  both  justice  and 
human  rights  as  are  involved  in  her  church 
system,  at  her  rule  in  India,  at  her  arbitrary 
and,  at  times,  wicked  domineering  over  weak 
and  disorganised  nations  —  to  talk  of  love  of 
both  justice  and  human  rights  as  traits  of 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  67 

English  character.  But  no  man  can  live  in 
London  long  and  not  understand  the  problem. 
The  acts  which  in  his  government  the  English 
man  consents  to,  in  his  individual  capacity  he 
abhors;  and  while  his  fleets  beat  down  the 
unoffending  gates  of  China  and  his  armies 
commit  huge  fillibusterings  in  India,  there  is  no 
great  city  in  the  world  where  a  stranger  is  so 
certain  of  justice,  or  the  weak  are  so  effectually 
upheld  against  the  strong,  as  in  London.  The 
law  is  blind,  crooked,  and  perverse,  but  sure 
and  equal;  its  administration  is  on  the  practice 
of  bygone  ages,  slow,  reticular,  complicated; 
but  where  it  is  a  question  of  justice,  no  human 
jurisprudence  is  more  effective  or  impartial.  It  is 
too  much  a  city  of  shopkeepers — but  of  great 
shopkeepers,  with  a  large  mercantile  morality 
such  as  accounts  for  a  commercial  power  and 
prosperity  unrivalled  since  the  world  began.* 
What  London  does,  it  does  slowly  but  well. 
English  civilisation  is  not  full  of  fine-spun  theories 
and  declamatory  recognitions,  but  is,  in  all  the 
personal  relations,  profoundly  moral,  and  (if  some 
times  mistakenly)  religious  as  well;  and  if  the 
morality  be  of  a  rather  uncharitable  type,  and 
the  religion  brings  out  now  and  then  its  Jugger 
naut  car,  it  is  at  least  something  that  it  main 
tains  the  steady  pursuit  of  human  well-being. 
All  that  is  hard  and  unsympathetic,  ugly  and 

*  The  little  London  shopkeepers  cheat  you  with  the  readiness  of  their 
Italian  colleagues,  but  the  big  traders  know  the  value  of  commercial 
morality  as  it  is  understood  in  no  other  nation. 


68  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

unsentimental,  in  London,  you  see  as  you  drive 
or  walk  from  the  station  to  your  hotel;  all 
that  is  servile  and  snobbish,  and  respectable  and 
extortionate,  after  you  have  got  there;  and  as 
you  sit  by  your  window  in  the  dim  November 
evening,  waiting  for  your  coal  fire  to  break  the 
chill  which  begins  to  enter  your  soul,  I  misdoubt 
much  if  you  do  not  begin  to  forswear  England. 

All  that  man  has  done  for  London  has  been 
to  the  eye  ill  done;  nature  has  been  bounteous 
to  her  as  to  few  cities.  Illimitable  liberty  of 
growth,  equal  facility  of  access,  a  plain  country 
round,  and  the  sea  at  its  gates;  the  railway 
radiating  and  the  tide  ebbing  and  flowing  with 
the  traffic  sustained  by  the  wealth  accumulated 
in  centuries.  No  one  knows  how  rich  she  is,  and 
no  one  who  has  not  wandered  about  her  for 
weeks  can  conjecture  how  huge.  We  may  talk 
of  our  western  empire  and  our  admirable  ports, 
of  our  growth  and  our  growing  wealth;  but 
here  is,  and  will  remain  for  generations,  the 
centre  of  the  commercial  and  political  world, 
the  focus  of  intellectual  activity,  and  the  mint 
of  thought.  Here  ferments  the  largest  and  most 
highly-developed  humanity  which  as  yet  the  uni 
versal  mother  has  given  birth  to,  and  here  the 
whole  world's  intellect  comes  to  pay  its  homage. 
We  boast,  but  out  of  this  mint  of  London  comes 
most  of  what  is  newest  as  well  as  of  what  is 
rarest  in  human  work.  "  Solitude  is  the  nurse 
of  all  great  thought,"  but  society  is  its  mother; 
and,  in  London,  society  is  more  complex  and 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  69 

solitude  more  easy  of  access  than  in  any  other 
of  all  the  aggregations  of  men.  The  seclusion 
of  the  backwoods  is  not  more  complete,  so  far 
as  intellectual  or  social  influences  are  concerned, 
than  lodgings  in  some  of  the  out-of-the-way 
quarters  of  London.  The  extremes  meet  —  the 
publicity  of  the  court  journal  and  a  privacy 
which  defies  the  detective  police;  a  wealth,  not 
of  individuals,  as  with  us,  but  of  classes,  which 
suspends  the  laws  of  political  economy,  and  a 
concomitant  poverty  which  threatens  one  day  to 
subvert  them;  vortices  of  prosperity  and  misery, 
into  which  society  at  its  extremes  rushes  with 
accelerating  and  concentrating  velocity;  here  a 
quarter  where,  in  teeming  filth,  humanity  is 
crowded  out  of  existence,  hour  by  hour,  with  a 
destitution  and  degradation  of  woe  uniquely  the 
property  of  London — a  bottomless  pit  of  misery, 
emergence  from  which  into  anything  by  death 
must  be  light  and  life;  and  then  a  region  of 
palaces,  with  a  luxury  and  profusion  such  as 
England's  kings,  even  two  hundred  years  ago, 
would  have  held  as  fabulous :  whatever  there  is 
of  most  opposite  and  extreme  in  life  or  death, 
in  power  or  utter  impotence,  in  having  or  want 
ing,  is  here. 

London  is  one  of  the  few  perennial  sensations 
of  this  world — like  the  sea,  a  primeval  forest, 
Sahara,  or  the  multitude  of  stars,  all  measur 
able,  doubtless,  but  in  terms  between  which  and 
the  infinite  we  can  no  more  perceive  the  dis 
tinction  than  we  can  from  the  top  of  St.  Paul's 


70  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

perceive  the  margin  of  the  city.  You  enter  it 
not  knowing  exactly  where,  and  when  you  leave 
it  you  do  so  by  so  fine  degrees  that  you  have 
not  been  able  to  say  where  the  town  ended  and 
the  country  began.  It  draws  all  England  to  it. 
It  pervades  the  realm.  Even  the  cabmen  do  not 
know  the  whole  of  it.  When  you  have  spent 
months  exploring  it,  you  find  some  day  a  new 
quarter  opening  to  your  eyes.  I  believe  that  no 
one  can  appreciate  it  fully  but  an  American 
thoroughly  versed  in  English  history  and  in  the 
practical  knowledge  of  his  own  country.  To  him 
all  the  historical  associations  have  the  mingled 
charms  of  novelty  and  antiquity;  there  is  the 
delightful  surprise  of  seeing  a  real  and  vitalised 
antiquity,  which  strikes  him  much  like  going 
into  Barbarossa's  cavern  and  finding  the  Middle 
Ages  just  waking  up.  In  his  picture  gallery 
nothing  is  cheapened  by  common  uses,  and  no 
thing  lost  by  contradictory  associations ;  Henry 
VIII.'s  palace  has  not  been  forever  a  barber's 
shop,  or  the  Strand  a  tide-way  of  shopkeeping. 
Familiarity  breeds  contempt,  indeed,  and  no 
London-bred  boy  can  have  a  reverence  for  an 
antiquity  he  saw  white-washed  yesterday.  We 
come  to  the  old  scenes  with  an  ancestral  rever 
ence  for  objects  which  are  not  only  England's 
but  ours — in  which  we  have  the  romantic  in 
terest  of  historical  cause  without  the  galling 
burden  of  political  effect.  English  associations 
are  to  us  utterly  delightful,  and  London  especi 
ally  a  huge  romance,  a  bazaar  of  the  Arabian 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  71 

Nights,  in  which  at  one  time  we  encounter 
Cromwell,  and  at  another  Dick  Whittington. 

But  do  not  imagine  that  you  can  get  the  char 
acteristic  impression  of  London  by  running  over  it. 
When  curiosity  is  satisfied  and  such  familiarity  as 
a  stranger  can  get  is  attained,  it  will  still  be  reserved 
for  some  moment  of  a  sublime  quiet  and  removal 
from  details  to  give  you  the  key-note  of  its  great 
ness.  Where  I  used  to  live,  in  a  suburb  five  miles 
from  St.  Paul's,  when  sitting  by  my  study  window, 
sight-lost  from  the  city  proper,  I  could  hear  the 
roar  of  the  traffic,  like  the  sea  on  a  rocky  shore 
— the  rush  of  incessant  trains  along  the  iron  ways, 
the  rumble  of  myriads  of  drays  along  hundreds  of 
miles  of  stone-paved  streets  (for  which  wood  is  now 
being  in  part  substituted),  each  no  more  to  the 
general  symphony  than  the  hum  of  a  gnat  to  the 
sounds  of  a  summer  day — a  volume  of  sound  un- 
intermitting  from  dawn  till  dark.  Yet  I  was 
bowered  in  green  trees,  with  cowslip  and  daisy- 
flecked  fields  spread  out  under  my  eyes  —  not  a 
spire,  not  a  chimney-stack  of  the  metropolis  visible ; 
and  the  carols  of  larks  and  thrushes,  the  song  of 
the  nightingale,  run  through  the  web  of  sounds 
like  gold  and  silver  threads  through  a  dingy  fabric, 
with  the  twitter  of  scores  of  sparrows  like  tiny 
spangles  thrown  on  at  random.  Out  of  the 
monotone  bursts  the  individual  roar  of  a  nearer 
train,  the  scream  of  a  whistle,  and  the  roar  dies 
away  again  into  the  sullen  monody.  This  is  audible 
London. 

If  you  want  to  see  what  the  traffic  of  London  is 


72  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

like,  go  to   Clapham  Junction,  where  the    great 
railway  systems  connect.     The  rails  lie  together 
like   the  wires  of    a    grand    piano.      System  and 
organisation  have  done  their  best,  and  nearly  two 
thousand  trains  a  day  run  over  them.      It  is  a 
bewilderment.      In  and  out,  coming,  going,  slow 
trains  and  fast  trains :  one  side  of  you  halts  a  train, 
and  while  you  watch  its  wheels  slowing,  an  express 
rushes  past  on  the  other  side  like  a  tornado  of 
iron ;  no  shrieking  of  whistles  or  clanging  of  bells 
as  on  our  railways  —  they  keep  their  signals  for 
their  officials,  and  outsiders  must  expose  themselves 
at   their  own  risks — only  a  rush,  a  blast  of  wind 
that  almost  takes  your  breath  or  draws  you  into 
its  eddy  when  it  has  gone  by,  a  torrent  of  carriage 
windows,  and  you  see  the  rear  of  the  last  carriage 
shrinking  before  your  eyes  as  it  leaves  you ;  and 
the  fast  express  has  come  and  gone  in  a  space  of 
time  which  you  could  hardly  find  on  the  dial  of 
your  watch.    Up  and  down  the  lines  you  see  signal- 
posts  and  semaphores  —  arms  working;    by  night 
lamps    green,    red,    white,    the    language    of    the 
railway,  but  no  confusion;    every  man  knows  his 
place,  or  forgets  it  at  his  bodily  peril.     You  ask 
the   official   when   your   train   is    due:    "In    two 
minutes " ;  and  as  the  clock  hands  point,  the  train 
comes.    He  knows  to  the  second  when  it  left  the 
last  station,  whether  it  be  on  table-time  or  behind 
it,  as  it  generally  is ;  every  movement  is  recorded, 
and  every  train  has  its  place  and    moment.      A 
tunnel-way  for  passengers  connects  the  whole,  so 
that  no  one  is  allowed  to  cross  the  rails  except  the 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  73 

officials,  who  grow  foolhardy  and  now  and  then 
come  to  grief.  The  guard  at  the  junction  told  me 
one  day  of  the  killing  of  one  of  the  porters,  who 
undertook  to  cross  the  line  in  front  of  the  fast 
express,  and  was  struck  midway  the  rails  by  the 
full  front  of  the  locomotive.  He  was  knocked  like  a 
ball  twenty  feet,  and  when  they  reached  him  there 
was  no  quiver  even  in  his  flesh.  If  a  shot  from  a 
twenty-inch  Rodman  gun  had  hit  him,  it  would 
not  have  expunged  life  more  completely  and 
instantaneously.  It  is  a  saying  of  the  denizens 
about  Clapham  Junction,  that,  on  the  average,  one 
man  is  killed  every  six  weeks.  One  wonders,  after 
having  watched  the  traffic  a  half -hour,  that  some 
one  is  not  killed  every  day.  Look  cityward  and 
see  the  trains  flying  —  diverging  eastward,  west 
ward,  northward,  line  under  line  three  deep, 
crossing  each  other,  diving  under  or  going  over, 
but  never  on  the  same  level,  and  then  sweeping  by 
long  curves  round  the  huge  circumference  of 
suburban  London,  a  girdle  of  iron,  meeting, 
crossing,  uniting,  separating  again  on  the  opposite 
side. 

Neither  the  sounds  nor  the  sights  of  London 
impressed  me  as  did  its  labyrinth  of  railways ; 
no  other  evidence  of  the  power  and  intelligence 
of  England  has  ever  seemed  to  me  like  this 
stupendous  accumulation  of  engineering  accom 
plishment  :  tunnels  under  the  river  and  bridges 
over  it ;  the  long  arcades  of  the  railway  approaches, 
and  the  still  more  surprising  vaults  of  the  under 
ground  tunnelling  under  the  dense  houses,  with  an 


74  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

inner  circle  of  communication — the  most  surprising 
engineering  feat  in  the  world,  and  perhaps  the 
most  costly,  considering  its  extent,  the  cost  being 
£1,000,000  per  mile,  and  all  to  help  you  get  about 
the  city  quicker.  If  the  enterprise  be  astonishing, 
how  much  more  the  need  which  impelled  it  and 
maintains  it. 

But,  imperial  as  London  is  in  all  that  pertains 
to  industrial  and  commercial  power,  it  is  in  the 
architectural  manifestations  of  metropolitanism 
(except  size)  as  provincial  as  New  York  or  Boston. 
It  is  impossible  to  say  that  architectural  feeling  is 
exotic  in  England,  not  knowing  with  absolute 
certainty  whether  they  were  Englishmen  who 
built  the  magnificent  old  cathedrals  or  not ;  but 
it  does  seem  that,  since  the  race  was  what  it  is, 
anything  aesthetic  is  a  chance  flower,  and  of  so 
rare  occurrence  that  its  exceptionality — its  want 
of  visible  cause  and  effect  in  precedent  or  succes 
sion — proves  the  rule  more  clearly  than  though 
no  example  had  ever  been  found.  The  cities  of 
the  civilised  and  half-civilised  world  will  not 
furnish  another  such  collection  of  hideous  public 
edifices,  with  so  little  originality,  so  little  sense 
of  fitness  or  artistic  insight,  as  the  capital  of 
England  shows.  A  man  who  could  develop 
artistic  fire  in  such  surroundings  must  be  of  a 
genius  irrepressible  by  any  compression  of  cir 
cumstance.  St.  Paul's  is  a  squat  parody  on  St. 
Peter's,  with  everything  that  is  ugly  of  the 
original  and  no  advantage  of  position  like  it — 
no  approaches,  no  ensemble,  a  petrified  infraction 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  75 

of  common-sense  and  aesthetic  judgment.  The 
British  Museum  is  an  ill-harmonised  pot-pourri 
of  Greek  motives;  Trafalgar  square,  a  curious 
antithesis  to  the  Place  de  la  Concorde,  with  the 
elaborate  imitation  of  that  freak  of  some  bar 
barous  Roman,  "Pompey's  Pillar,"  instead  of  the 
obelisk,  and  that  ludicrous  combination  of  the 
shut-up  and  elongated,  the  National  Gallery, 
crowning  it.  Even  most  of  the  later  buildings, 
when  there  is  a  determined  effort  to  be  original, 
impress  the  stranger  as  ghastly  evolutions  of  the 
stuff  of  which  nightmares  are  made.  All  things 
impress  one  with  an  immense  sense  of  solidity 
and  stolidity,  and,  if  I  am  not  over-fanciful,  with 
a  latent  contempt  of  the  outside  as  compared 
with  the  inside  of  the  house,  inherent  in  the 
English  nature.  What  that  most  characteristic 
defect  of  London  —  its  smoke  —  may  have  to  do 
with  this  utter  want  of  sympathy  with  the  ex 
teriors  of  their  buildings  in  the  minds  of  modern 
Londoners,  I  can  only  conjecture;  but  if  the  city 
were  another  Venice,  it  could  only  be  kept  beauti 
ful  by  pouring  its  canals  daily  over  its  buildings. 
I  recall  some  of  those  dreary  days  of  my  first 
November,  1852,  when,  sitting  by  my  hotel  window 
in  the  City,  I  used  to  look  out  into  the  midday 
gloom  under  the  impenetrable  veil,  with  a  shadow- 
less  world  before  me,  and  recall  the  oppression  of 
this  inversion  of  fantastic  elements,  where  by 
day  the  air  was  thick  and  oppressive,  and  when 
night  fell  the  stars  came  out  with  their  little 
consolations  for  the  loss  of  the  greater  luminary, 


76  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

and  could  see  the  black  flakes  of  condensed  coal- 
smoke  come  drifting,  floating  down  like  the  first 
flakes  of  a  snow-fall  —  a  snow  of  soot,  visible, 
palpable,  disastrous  to  gloves  and  linen  as  to 
stonework  and  to  colour  in  all  things.  And  what 
is  odd,  too,  this  comes  from  the  very  love  of 
brightness  and  cheeriness  at  home.  Offer  to  the 
Englishman  to-morrow  a  fuel  which  would  heat 
his  house  without  flame  or  smoke ;  give  him 
furnaces  which  would  consume  all  his  fuel  in 
some  subterranean  recess,  like  our  own,  and  he 
would  utterly  and  peremptorily  refuse  the  boon. 
To  him  his  open  grate  and  its  cheerful  flame, 
pitchy  and  smoke-evolving  as  it  is,  are  the  roc's 
egg  to  his  home.  London  may  be  dingy  and 
smoky,  Stygian  in  darkness  and  diurnal  in  its 
Egyptian  curse,  but  his  glad  hearth  shall  glow 
while  soft  coal  comes  from  the  mine.  It  shall 
darken  and  gloom  until  it  is  a  new  Pompeii  of 
drifting  soot  from  its  million  chimney-volcanoes, 
before  the  individual  love  of  light  and  comfort 
shall  become  civic,  and  London  burn  her  own 
smoke ! 

Civilisation  and  Christianity  are  in  all  inter 
mediate  stages  at  odds ;  the  former  in  the  highest 
ferment  does  but  disengage  the  latter  as  a  vola 
tile  essence.  Civilisation  brings  out  by  inexorable 
logic  those  extremes  of  human  condition  from 
both  of  which  Agur  prayed  to  be  preserved.  The 
rich  grow  richer  and  the  poor  poorer,  and  the 
laws  of  political  economy  go  on  asserting  them 
selves,  by  which  we  see  that  he  who  has  the 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON    77 

power,  has  a  law  by  which  he  may  make  it  greater, 
and  he  who  has  it  not  shall  lose  even  the  little 
he  seems  to  have;  and  as  in  London  the  energy 
of  political  economy  and  of  progressive  civilisa 
tion  have  found  their  largest  expression,  we  must 
expect  to  find  men  divided  into  the  widest  ex- 
.tremes  of  social  condition — wealth  fabulous  and 
poverty  incredible.  To  one  who  has  tried  the 
hard  side  of  human  existence  and  known  how 
little  will  keep  a  man  or  woman  from  the  grave, 
it  is  enough  to  say  that  men  and  women  die 
statistically  in  London  from  starvation — not  the 
sudden  death  of  men  shut  in  a  dungeon  so  to 
die,  but  with  long  and  unrelieved  deprivation  just 
sufficient  to  make  them  waste  away  with  intoler 
able  craving,  mocked  by  the  merest  dalliance  with 
alimentation.  Some  such  in  their  involuntary 
apotheosis  I  have  seen  —  with  their  gaunt  faces 
glued  to  those  flaming  windows  of  the  Cheapside 
chop-houses,  looking  with  hungry  eyes  and  tremu 
lous  lips  at  the  piles  of  luscious  steaks  and  saddles 
of  prime  mutton,  the  hell  of  Tantalus  without  his 
sin,  for  these  are  mostly  the  honest,  as  honesty 
goes  in  London  streets  —  stand  with  unmoving 
faces  and  unconscious  of  whatever  goes  on  around 
them,  like  fascinated  beings  unable  to  break  away 
from  the  charm.  I  remember  especially  a  young 
girl,  not  over  twelve,  whose  face  I  saw  pressed 
against  the  window-pane  of  a  restaurant  where 
I  was  lunching  one  day — a  grave,  hollow-eyed 
creature,  who,  without  a  smile  or  a  change  of 
any  feature  save  the  rolling  of  her  eyes  from  one 


78  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

dainty  to  another  during  the  whole  of  my  lunch- 
time,  fed  her  only  available  sense  on  this  phantom 
banquet  —  but  who,  when  on  going  out  I  offered 
her  a  huge  piece  of  plain  cake,  refused  it  in  fright 
and  with  crimsoned  cheeks,  as  though  I  had  caught 
her  in  theft;  and  it  was  only  after  repeated  in 
sistence,  and  on  my  telling  her  to  take  it  home 
to  the  little  ones  (for  there  are  always  little  ones 
in  this  case),  that  she  took  it,  bewildered,  and 
went  her  way. 

Spiritual  gravitation  is  as  irresistible  as  physical, 
and  men  fly  to  its  centre  as  grains  of  sand  to  the 
earth;  the  weaker  and  the  less  individual  they 
are,  the  sooner  they  obey  the  law;  only  the  few 
who  have  the  centrifugal  power  of  self-assertion 
can  live  content  away  from  others.  The  clod 
hopper  who  digs  and  never  dreams  or  knows 
what  lies  beyond  his  farm  remains  rustic;  but 
once  he  has  come  within  the  attraction  of  the 
aggregate  humanity  of  the  city,  he  drifts  helpless 
into  the  vortex,  and  rots  and  dies  in  the  mass  of 
corrupted  humanity — helpless  in  himself,  because 
he  had  not  strength  to  stand  alone,  and  hopeless, 
because  there  are  so  many  like  him  that  no 
human  prevision  could  care  for  all  the  poor  of 
a  great  city  like  London.  It  is  no  place  for  the 
helpless  and  the  friendless,  and  yet  it  is  precisely 
those  who  drift  most  readily  to  it.  There  seems 
to  be  a  universal  belief  among  the  very  poor  that 
help  is  only  in  great  cities.  Dick  Whittington 
entertained  a  very  common  superstition  and 
strengthened  it;  and  Heaven  only  knows  how 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  79 

many,  with  this  golden  dream  in  their  hearts, 
have  gone  to  London  to  die  in  its  dirt  or  drown 
in  its  tide.  And  once  in  the  city,  the  deluded 
never  leave  it;  the  company  in  misery  which  it 
offers  to  them  is  better  than  any  emigration ;  the 
fascination  of  crowds  is  stronger,  even  with  better 
men  and  women,  than  any  good  in  solitary  inde 
pendence.  This  and  the  innate  laziness  of  man 
kind,  the  insanity  to  escape  all  bonds  of  labour, 
are  more  the  causes  of  the  destitution  and  misery 
of  London  than  any  social  wrong  or  want  of 
charity  and  benevolence  in  the  wealthy.  These 
great  cities  will  always  be  crowded  to  the  last 
limits  of  their  capacity.  Relieve  the  importunate 
and  improvident  of  to-day  by  a  determinate 
provision,  and  to-morrow  there  will  appear  mys 
teriously  as  many  new  improvidents  and  un 
fortunates,  candidates  for  the  same  provision; 
the  whole  realm  of  beggary  and  imprevision  will 
make  a  hitch  forward,  and  the  serried  line  will 
still  stand  like  that  at  the  post-office  windows 
or  theatre  doors  at  times,  waiting  for  another 
vacancy  and  pushing  on,  always  as  long,  always 
as  miserable,  and  all  the  more  improvident  as 
provision  is  made  by  others.  This  is  the  poverty 
of  London:  not  a  chance-come  misfortune  which 
some  sad  widow  may  have  in  a  country  village, 
her  support  and  provider  being  suddenly  gone, 
struggling  with  a  new  and  straiter  living  to 
which  in  time  she  adapts  herself  or  dies;  not  a 
sudden  cutting  away  of  the  small  margin  and  a 
distress  in  the  house  for  rent,  which  hard  work- 


80  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

ing  sometimes  gives  a  labourer,  but  an  habitual 
living  on  what  may  come  through  picking  up  by 
chance  —  pilfering  and  stealth  to  the  worse  and 
slow  starvation  to  the  better  natures,  with  gradual 
extinction  of  all  that  is  human  to  all  —  squalor, 
filth,  a  sinking  till  sense  of  degradation  is  lost 
and  the  poor  soul  slides  into  utter  vice  as  a  boat 
adrift  goes  down  into  the  sea. 

Look  into  the  quarters  of  this  poverty:  for 
convenience,  in  some  of  the  streets  about  Good 
man's  Fields,  swarming  like  ant-hills :  shoals  of 
children  of  all  ages  below  four  or  five  encum 
bering  the  road-way,  careless  of  carriage  wheels, 
for  no  vehicle  ever  enters  here  except  the  huck 
ster's  cart  or  the  parish  hearse;  frousy,  sodden, 
beer-soaked  faces  of  women  thrust  out  at  the 
windows,  cursing  their  brats  who  cry  in  the  dirt 
below;  sauntering  men  who  look  at  you,  if  you 
are  decently  dressed,  as  if  your  personal  safety 
were  a  wrong  and  injustice  to  them;  young  girls, 
filthy,  slatternly,  leering,  jeering,  and  ogling, 
imagination  can  readily  conceive  what  for.  Men 
do  not  grow  to  manhood  in  such  slums  and  sun 
less  ways,  or  women  to  virtue  or  dignity.  All  is 
squalor  and  filth  and  utter  degradation  of  the 
divine  image.  And  this  is  one  of  the  inevitable 
results  of  the  highest  civilisation,  as  certainly  as 
that  London  is  greatest  and  most  civic  of  all 
great  cities. 

For  the  other  great  result  you  have  not  far 
to  go.  In  that  region  of  grim  and  forbidding 
palaces,  which,  like  AH  Baba's  cave,  are  nothing 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  81 

to  him  who  has  not,  but  everything  for  him 
who  has,  the  "open  sesame,"  any  one  will  answer 
our  purpose  —  this  one,  for  instance,  with  a 
covered  way  from  the  door  to  the  street,  lest  its 
dainty  inmates  should  catch  a  drop  of  rain  on 
the  way  to  their  carriage.  Within  all  is  order 
and  decorous  silence.  The  foot  falls  on  deep- 
piled  carpets.  In  the  intonation  of  the  low-toned 
command  is  the  highest  expression  of  that  incom 
municable,  indescribable,  and,  except  by  genera 
tions  of  cultivation,  unattainable  quality  we  call 
high  breeding.  In  the  reply  to  it  is  that  perfect 
antithesis  in  breeding,  which  we  ought  to  call 
low  —  the  profound,  unquestioning,  and  unhesi 
tating  prostration  of  self  of  the  traditional  hered 
itary  "  servant, "  disciplined  like  a  soldier,  who, 
as  his  master  never  permits  himself  to  express 
a  disturbing  emotion,  never  allows  himself  an 
expression  of  surprise  or  a  word  of  comment ; 
whose  self-command  is  as  great  as  his  master's, 
perhaps  greater — a  well  apparelled  statue,  save 
when  an  order  is  given ;  whose  bows  and  defer 
ence  for  his  master's  guests  are  graduated  by  the 
distance  at  which  they  sit  from  the  head  of  the 
table ;  a  human  creature  that  sees  nothing, 
knows  nothing,  and  believes  nothing  which  his 
master  does  not  expect  him  to  see  and  know  and 
believe ;  who,  if  he  thinks  of  a  heaven  at  all, 
never  dreams  that  it  can  be  the  same  thing  for 
his  master  and  himself:  he  hopes  to  meet  his 
father  and  grandfather  and  great-grandfather  in 
the  servants'  hall  of  that  celestial  abode  where 

F 


82  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

his  master  and  all  the  family  for  countless  gener 
ations  will  dwell  in  their  mundane  state ;  his 
brains  could  no  more  take  in  the  parable  of 
Dives  and  Lazarus  than  the  laws  of  Kepler,  and 
the  most  insensate  Chartist  or  Radical  could 
never  inspire  in  him  an  ambition  to  be  any 
thing  beyond  butler  in  his  master's  mansion. 

All  the  gorgeousness  and  luxury  about  them 
— master  and  servant — are  the  fit  trappings  of 
the  gentleman's  estate.  They  two  make  one,  a 
kind  of  social  centaur,  a  single  brain  and  a 
double  body.  The  civic  mechanism  necessitates 
other  grades  of  mankind,  but  this  is  the  summit 
level.  The  centaur  may  be  the  highest  expres 
sion  of  human  culture;  he  may  be  a  mere  vehicle 
of  pleasures — betting,  horse-racing,  with  no  con 
ception  of  or  respect  for  that  culture.  He  is  to 
all  the  world  the  personation  of  human  dignity, 
and  the  King  or  Queen  is  only  the  head  of  his 
order.  He  may  enjoy  the  refinements  his  ances 
tors'  wealth  has  gathered  round  him,  and  justify 
his  position,  or  he  may  bury  himself  deeper  in 
stultifying  indulgences  by  the  weight  of  it — be 
the  best  or  worst  of  men;  he  is  still  the  cynosure 
of  the  Old  World's  regards — milord  Anglais.  In 
his  sphere  the  echo  of  social  wants  and  wrongs 
dies  away ;  the  tenants  on  his  estate  are  as  well 
cared  for  as  his  favourite  flocks,  and  he  does  his 
duty  to  all  who  depend  socially  on  him.  Beyond, 
all  is  ignored  which  disturbs  the  serenity  of  that 
earthly  heaven  in  whose  immobility  he  abides.  For 
his  existence,  civilisation,  law,  order,  the  church, 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  83 

army,  and  navy  are  the  guaranties  and  pre-requis- 
ites.  It  is  for  him,  according  to  the  original  theory 
of  the  British  constitution,  that  the  state  exists. 

In  other  European  countries  of  approximate 
civilisation,  his  congener  has  gone  under ;  he, 
wiser,  draws  up  to  him  the  social  elements  that 
might  menace  his  supremacy,  and  which,  by  their 
necessity  to  the  state,  are  necessary  to  him — 
the  banker,  the  successful  administrator,  soldier, 
admiral,  and  even  the  church,  whose  power  is  not 
of  this  world,  is  led  in  by  its  lord  bishops.  So 
that  the  centaur,  being  the  governing  and  the 
governed  in  one,  wins  over  from  any  possible 
opposition,  whatever  elements  may  be  assimilated 
to  his  class,  which  outside  its  limits  might  be 
dangerous,  and  so  fights  off  the  fate  which  has 
befallen  his  congeners  of  the  Continent. 

In  the  strictest  social  creed  of  the  centaur,  it  is 
held  as  an  essential  to  this  assimilation  that  the 
candidate  shall  not  only  never  have  done  any 
thing  useful  for  its  due  compensation,  but  that 
society  shall  not  be  able  to  remember  when  one 
of  his  ancestors  did  so,  the  bluest  blood  being 
that  of  him  whose  remote  forefather  did  but 
follow  the  original  centaurial  proposition  of 
taking  all  that  they  wanted  wherever  they  found 
it,  and,  by  levying  contributions  on  all  the  classes 
of  society,  enabling  his  remotest  heirs  and  suc 
cessors  to  enjoy  the  proceeds  in  complete  and 
reputable  abstention  from  gain  by  any  useful 
employment  —  useless  labour,  such  as  breeding 
and  running  race-horses,  etc.,  or  unpaid  labour 


84  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

in  science  and  art  being  perfectly  allowable  and 
possibly  praiseworthy,  with  centaurial  honours. 

Although  socially  dominant  in  all  England,  the 
centaur  is  only  to  be  known  in  London  in 
perfection,  or  the  extent  of  his  dominance  to 
be  recognised.  He  must  have  his  residence  in 
London,  no  matter  how  many  others  he  may 
have,  and  it  must  be  worthy  his  position.  There 
are  here  and  there  certain  literary  and  intellec 
tual  heresies  and  heretics  refusing  to  recognise 
centaurdom  as  the  highest  of  human  good ;  but, 
in  general,  the  people  accept  the  distinction  by 
which,  when  they  are  overridden  by  the  cen 
taurs,  they  are  privileged  to  override  some  one 
else  in  the  grade  below  them,  and  each  one  in 
the  long  file  of  social  gradation  is  permitted  and 
perhaps  expected  to  be  a  toady  to  the  superior, 
and  a  bully  to  the  inferior  grades.  And  down 
to  the  very  substratum  of  beggars  and  crossing- 
sweepers,  there  is  a  keen  recognition  of  the 
social  stamp  of  "useless"  and  "useful,"  and  an 
inherent  contempt  of  the  latter  individual  as 
such.  I  have  noticed  scores  of  times  that,  when 
I  was  carrying  a  package  through  the  streets  of 
London,  the  beggars  and  sweepers  paid  no  atten 
tion  to  me.  The  centaur  and  the  beggar  agree 
in  one  thing,  that  a  man  who  carries  his  own 
parcels  is  beneath  their  social  recognition. 

It  is  to  London,  as  the  centre  of  all  that 
England  is  or  can  be,  that  these  two  classes 
gravitate — the  poles  of  civilised  humanity;  no 
where  but  in  London  could  they  find  their  com- 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  85 

mensurate  importance,  and  here  they  attain  their 
highest  perfection  and  greatest  development. 
Beggary  and  aristocracy  are  the  productions  par 
excellence  of  the  metropolis  of  civilisation;  the 
traits  which,  even  more  than  its  size  and  wealth, 
distinguish  it  from  all  the  cities  of  the  earth. 

And  from  all  this  antagonism  of  extremes, 
from  all  the  heat  and  ferment  of  this  alembic 
of  humanity — there  comes  not  only  much  refuse 
— dead  matter  which  goes  back  to  decay  and 
first  disorganisation — but  there  distils  the  truest, 
divinest  spirit  humanity  can  embody.  Here  does 
but  disengage  more  quickly  and  more  perfectly, 
what  may  be  of  better  than  aristocracy  and 
more  beautiful  than  court  or  state.  If  the 
individual  is  securest  in  his  individuality,  if  the 
one  talent  is  best  buried  in  the  retirement  of 
rustic  life,  if  philosopher  and  poet  find  in  their 
hearts  to  say  with  their  Roman  confrere,  "Procul, 
procul  este  profana"  and  float  tranquilly  down 
the  stream  of  life  alone,  yet  in  the  thickest 
melee  is  the  most  strength  won;  and  in  spite 
of  the  terrible  perversion  of  Christianity,  and 
the  palsying  condition  of  social  organisation, 
one  can  find  here  the  rarest  types  of  Christian 
and  of  mankind.  Who  escapes  humanity  shuns 
God. 

I  am  not  a  lover  of  great  cities;  their  ambi 
tions  and  ideals,  their  vulgarities  and  their 
urbanities,  are  alike  distasteful  to  me;  but  I 
must  say  that  I  have  known  in  London  the 
most  angelic  natures  that  it  has  ever  been  in 


86  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

my  lot  to  encounter.    Perhaps  I  should  have  seen 
still  better  if  my  eyes  had  been  open  wider. 

And  it  is  in  this  very  class  which  I  have,  in 
no  disparaging  sense,  termed  centauric,  the  aris 
tocracy,  where  social  independence  has  reached 
its  highest,  that  we  find  here  and  there,  cased 
like  the  flower  and  fruit  of  this  mighty  growth, 
in  extraneous  and  deciduous  leafage,  that  best 
type  of  humanity  as  the  world  knows  it,  the 
true  English  gentlefolk — beings  whose  exterior 
decorum  may  be  counterfeited  by  an  emulator, 
whose  inmost  gentleness  and  courtesy  may  be 
shadowed  forth  in  peer  or  peasant  who  love 
their  kind,  and  feel  the  common  bond  of  divine 
birth ;  but  whose  most  perfect  expression  of  noble 
demeanour  and  large  -  heartedness  can  only  be 
found  where  the  best  type  of  mind  has  been 
permitted  the  largest  and  richest  culture  and  the 
completest  freedom  of  hereditary  development  in 
the  most  favourable  external  circumstances.  There 
are  nobles  and  noblemen — men  who  seem  to  be 
conscious  only  that  surrounding  men  are  lower 
than  they;  and  others  whose  illumination  per 
vades  every  one  near  them  and  brings  all  up 
into  the  same  world  of  light  and  sweetness. 
The  prestige  of  nobility  is  founded  on  a  true 
human  instinct;  occasionally  one  finds  an  English 
nobleman  who  justifies  its  existence,  and  makes 
us  snobs  in  spite  of  our  democracy. 

I  could,  I  am  certain,  point  to  Americans  who, 
in  every  substantial  trait  of  the  gentleman,  will 
stand  comparison  with  any  aristocrat  born — men 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  87 

in  whom  gentlehood  has  grown  to  hereditary 
ripeness;  the  third  and  fourth  generations  of 
men  who  have  cultivated  on  American  soil  the 
virtues  of  honesty,  morality,  sincerity,  courtesy, 
self-abnegation,  humanity,  benevolence;  men  and 
women  whose  babyhood  was  cradled  in  those 
influences  which  make  what  we  call  "good  breed 
ing,"  and  to  whom  the  various  vulgarities  of  our 
parvenu  princes  are  as  foreign  as  to  the  bluest- 
blooded  heir  of  Norman  fortune;  and  this  is  to 
me  a  more  grateful  and  sympathetic  type  of 
humanity  than  that  of  its  English  congener.  But 
to  this  will  always  be  lacking  one  grace  which 
that  may  possess  —  the  majesty  of  the  born 
legislator  and  ruler;  the  air  of  habitual  com 
mand  and  control,  hereditary  as  are  all  generic 
traits,  good  or  bad,  and  which  imposes  itself  on 
the  consciousness  of  all  men.  This,  be  it  for  the 
bettering  or  the  worsering  of  the  type,  is  to 
our  democratic,  ruled,  levelled,  and  ballot-boxed 
civilisation  forbidden  forever;  and  the  fustian 
heredities  of  quickly  and  perhaps  ill-made  million 
aires,  for  ever  so  many  times  told,  will  never  be 
other  than  a  curious  caricature  of  it.  Theoretic 
ally,  we  must  gainsay  it;  but  when  all  is  said, 
be  it  of  our  original  paradise-planting,  or  a  devil's 
graft  got  among  the  thorns  and  thistles  of  our 
exile,  the  growth  of  a  certain  reverence  for  a 
time-honoured  nobility  has  become  a  part  of 
every  gentle  nature,  which  only  time  and  as 
siduity  can,  but  which  they  certainly  will  eradi 
cate — but  not  to-day,  nor  while  the  English 


88  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

nobility  is  what,  as  a  whole,  it  is.  We  may 
prefer,  in  our  struggles  of  race,  the  independence 
of  the  Athenian  hoplite,  of  the  quick-footed 
runner;  but  the  centaur  had  his  side  of  the 
story,  and  the  same  marble  immortalises  them 
both. 

We  Americans  are  fond  of  talking  of  being 
our  own  masters;  but  the  man  who  is  his  own 
master  is  also  his  own  servant.  A  well-dis 
ciplined  army  is  the  type  of  highest  human  de 
velopment  —  compassionate,  unflinching  strategy 
in  its  head;  intelligent,  unhesitating  and  unques 
tioning  obedience  in  its  body.  He  who  in  an 
army  will  exercise  his  own  judgment  and  will,  is 
a  mutineer.  Independence  means  isolation  and 
incompletion ;  association  is  the  true  life,  social, 
political,  and  spiritual. 

The  empire  of  England  owes  its  existence  to 
this  phenomenon.  The  brain  to  command  coupled 
with  the  nerve  to  obey,  and  both  to  care  less 
for  annihilation  than  for  defeat;  the  will  to 
lead  and  the  will  to  follow,  co-ordination  as  if 
of  brain  and  hand;  the  union  of  antitheses  in  an 
existence  more  effective  and  powerful,  socially 
and  politically,  than  the  most  perfect  individu 
ality — that  is  what  I  mean  by  the  centaur,  a 
higher  evolution  of  civic  life  than  our  boasted 
political  equality  and  personal  independence. 
This  makes  empire  possible  and  reconcilable 
with  the  good  of  ruler  and  ruled  alike.  And 
more  than  this,  it  is  the  greatest  element  in  that 
cause  which  has  for  effect  that,  while  every  other 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  89 

wealthy  nation  in  our  time  is  drifting  into  a 
social  conflict  of  ominous  outlook,  with  grow 
ing  political  and  social  corruption,  England  has 
steadily  risen  in  civic  and  political  purity. 
Wherever  else  I  look,  in  Europe,  at  least,  I  see 
only  reform  by  revolution,  while  in  England  it 
comes  steadily  by  law. 

London  is  indeed  a  microcosm,  not  merely  that 
it  is  large,  but  because  everything  is  in  it;  and 
with  all  its  intense  commonplaceness  and  hum 
drum  conservatism,  there  is  a  degree  of  un 
expectedness  which  keeps  one  on  an  intellectual 
alert.  No  city  grows  like  it;  yet  you  pass  from 
quarters  of  new  palaces,  on  ground  which  even 
I  remember  as  once  an  expanse  of  kitchen- 
gardens  as  remote  from  metropolitanism  as  the 
hop-fields  of  Kent,  to  others  where  the  dinginess 
of  the  Middle  Ages  seems  to  linger,  and  where 
the  only  change  of  the  century  past  must  be 
of  deaths  and  births;  into  "no  thoroughfare" 
squares,  round  which  the  flood  of  improvement 
has  swept  without  entering;  into  places  that 
impress  one  with  the  idea  of  antiquity  far  more 
than  does  the  Parthenon  or  the  Colosseum,  dusty, 
grassy,  and  silent,  where,  if  you  chance  to  see 
a  merry,  playing  child,  it  startles  you  as  an  an 
achronism.  One  day,  perhaps,  the  republic  and 
the  proletary  and  the  boulevard  will  come:  be 
sure  that  they  will  be  to  the  breaking  of  many 
hearts  grown  old  in  a  world  of  circumstance  and 
association  which  will  not  suffer  change. 

But,    to    the    mere    passenger,    London's    most 


90  AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON 

attractive  point  is  her  suburban  wealth  —  the 
lovely  wedding  of  city  and  country  in  Richmond, 
Twickenham,  and  Barnes,  and  so  all  round  by 
Clapham,  Dulwich,  Norwood,  and  the  Crystal 
Palace,  but  especially  near  the  Thames,  whose 
lovely  windings,  with  frequent  villages  and  luxu 
riant  meadows  always  green  with  that  vivid 
greenness  which  no  climate  besides  this  can  boast 
of,  remind  me  of  the  early-summer  Mohawk  in 
its  most  gentle  portions.  Great  glades  of  oak  and 
elm  come  down  to  the  water's  edge,  and  a  sward 
that  all  the  year  round  is  like  a  carpet,  with  a 
river-fringe  of  willows  and  flags,  and  the  swans 
going  in  and  out  undisturbed,  following  the  ebb 
down  to  the  city  even,  and  the  flood  back  to 
their  homes,  running  the  gauntlet  of  steamer 
and  wherry,  with  none  to  make  them  afraid; 
and  the  lazy,  picturesque  barges  drift  down  from 
their  inland  markets,  catching  the  ebb  while 
it  serves,  and  waiting  at  anchor  till  it  comes 
again,  their  rusty  tackle  and  tawny  sails  so 
unlike  what  our  seafaring  man  would  settle  his 
fancy  to,  and  yet  so  beloved  by  painters  and 
etchers. 

Yes,  London  ends  as  it  began,  with  the  Thames. 
The  dreamy  reaches  of  its  upper  course,  with 
their  framing  of  rural  picturesqueness,  their 
wealth  of  park  and  villa,  the  meed  and  stimulus  at 
once  of  the  greatest  of  commercial  communities, 
run  by  insensible  degrees  of  change  into  those  so 
unlike  in  all  surroundings,  so  stirring  and  vibrant 
with  commerce  and  speculation;  and  the  two 


AN  AMERICAN'S  REVERIE  OVER  LONDON  91 

extremes,  corresponding  as  heart  and  brain  the 
one  to  the  other,  or  as  root  and  branch,  are  what 
makes  the  life  and  immensity  of  London,  and,  in 
one  sense,  of  England.  Above  the  river  in  which 
the  miserable  perish  and  on  which  the  fortunate 
grow  rich,  runs  the  other  tide  whose  flood  leads 
On  to  fortune,  whose  sources  are  in  the  sea  empire, 
and  which  debouches  in  the  lands  of  the  little 
island;  above  the  river  of  the  painters  and  poets, 
winding  through  the  downs  and  meadows  of  the 
rarest  of  cultivated  landscape  out  to  the  reaches 
where  the  melancholy  sea  breeds  its  fogs  and 
damp  east  winds,  is  that  of  the  merchant  and 
politician,  having  its  springs  in  the  uttermost 
parts  of  the  earth,  and  pouring  out  its  golden 
tribute  on  the  lands  whence  the  other  steals  its 
drift  and  ooze.  Ill  dawns  the  day  for  humanity 
when  England's  prosperity  finds  its  final  flood. 


JOHN  RUSKIN 


I  WAS  sitting  one  afternoon  with  Longfellow,  on 
the  porch  of  the  old  house  at  Cambridge,  when 
the  conversation  turned  on  intellectual  develop 
ment,  and  he  referred  to  a  curious  phenomenon, 
of  which  he  instanced  several  cases,  and  which  he 
compared  to  the  double  stars,  of  two  minds  not 
personally  related  but  forming  a  binary  system, 
revolving  simultaneously  around  each  other  and 
around  some  principle  which  they  regarded  in 
different  lights.  I  do  not  remember  his  instances, 
but  that  which  at  once  came  to  my  mind  was  the 
very  interesting  one  of  Turner  and  Ruskin.  The 
complementary  relation  of  the  great  writer  and 
the  imaginative  painter  is  one  of  the  most — indeed, 
the  most  interesting  that  I  know  in  intellectual 
history :  the  one  a  master  in  all  that  belongs  to 
verbal  expression  but  singularly  deficient  in  the 
gifts  of  the  artist,  feeble  in  drawing,  with  a  most 
inaccurate  perception  of  colour  and  no  power  of 
invention;  the  other  the  most  stupendous  of 
idealists,  the  most  consummate  master  of  colour 
orchestration  the  world  has  ever  seen,  but  so 
curiously  devoid  of  the  gifts  of  language  that  he 
could  hardly  learn  to  write  grammatically  or  coher- 

92 


JOHN  RUSKIN  93 

ently,  and  when  he  spoke,  omitting  so  many  words 
that  often  his  utterances,  like  those  of  a  child, 
required  interpretation  by  one  accustomed  to  his 
ways  before  a  stranger  could  understand  them. 
Ruskin  is  a  man  reared  and  moulded  in  the 
straightest  Puritanism,  abhorring  uncleanness  of 
all  kinds,  generous  to  extravagance,  moved  by  the 
noblest  humanitarian  impulses,  morbidly  averse 
to  anything  that  partakes  of  sensuality,  and  re 
sponsive  as  a  young  girl  to  appeals  to  his  ten 
derness  and  compassion.  Turner  was  a  miser ; 
churlish ;  a  satyr  in  his  morals — not  merely  a 
sensualist,  but  satisfied  only  by  occasional  in 
dulgences  in  the  most  degrading  debauchery?  and 
even  in  his  painting  sometimes  giving  expression 
to  images  so  filthy  that  when,  after  his  death,  the 
trustees  came  to  overhaul  his  sketches,  there  were 
many  which  they  were  obliged  to  destroy  in  regard 
for  common  decency.  It  is  hardly  possible  to 
conceive  of  a  more  complete  antithesis  than  that 
in  the  natures  of  these  two,  who  turn,  and  will 
turn  so  long  as  English  art  and  English  letters 
endure,  around  the  same  centre  of  art  and  each 
around  the  other.  In  fact,  to  the  great  majority 
of  our  race  Turner  is  seen  through  the  eyes  of 
Ruskin,  and  Ruskin  is  only  known  as  the  eulogist 
of  Turner. 

The  conjunction  leaves  both  misunderstood  by 
the  general  mind.  Ruskin  looks  at  the  works  of 
the  great  landscape  painter  much  as  the  latter 
looked  at  nature — not  for  what  is  in  the  thing 
looked  at,  but  for  the  sentiments  it  awakens.  The 


94  JOHN  RUSKIN 

world's  art  does  not  present  anything  to  rival 
Turner's  in  its  defiance  of  nature.  He  used  nature 
when  it  pleased  him  to  do  so,  but  when  it  pleased 
him  better  he  belied  her  with  the  most  reckless 
audacity.  He  had  absolutely  no  respect  for  truth. 
His  colour  was  the  most  splendid  of  impossibilities, 
and  his  topography  like  the  geography  of  dreams  ; 
yet  Ruskin  has  spent  a  great  deal  of  his  life  in 
persuading  himself  and  the  world  that  that  colour 
was  scientifically  correct,  and  in  hunting  for  the 
points  of  view  from  which  he  drew  his  composi 
tions.  His  conviction  that  Turner  was  always 
doing  his  best,  if  in  a  mysterious  way,  to  tell  the 
truth  about  nature  is  invincible.  Early  in  the 
period  of  my  acquaintance  with  him  we  had  a 
vivacious  discussion  on  this  matter  in  his  own 
house;  and  to  convince  him  that  Turner  was 
quite  indifferent  as  to  matters  of  natural  pheno 
mena,  I  called  Ruskin's  attention  to  the  view  out 
of  the  window,  which  was  of  the  Surrey  hills,  a 
rolling  country  whose  grassy  heights  were  basking 
in  a  glorious  summer  sunlight  and  backed  by  a 
pure  blue  sky,  requesting  him  then  to  have 
brought  down  from  the  room  where  it  was  hung 
a  drawing  by  Turner  in  which  a  similar  effect  was 
treated.  The  hill  in  nature  was,  as  it  always  will 
be  if  covered  by  vegetation  and  under  the  same 
circumstances,  distinctly  darker  than  the  sky; 
Turner's  was  relieved  in  pale  yellow  green  against 
a  deep  blue  sky,  stippled  down  to  a  delicious  aerial 
profundity.  Ruskin  gave  up  the  case  in  point,  but 
still  clung  to  the  general  rule.  In  fact,  having 


JOHN  RUSKIN  95 

begun  his  system  of  art  teaching  on  the  hypothesis 
that  Turner's  way  of  seeing  nature  was  scientific 
ally  the  most  correct  that  art  knew,  he  had  never 
been  able  to  abandon  it  and  admit  that  Turner 
only  sought,  as  was  the  case,  chromatic  relations 
which  had  no  more  to  do  with  facts  of  colour  than 
the  music  of  Mendelssohn's  "  Wedding  March " 
has  to  do  with  the  emotions  of  the  occasion  on 
which  it  is  played.  His  assumption  of  Turner's 
veracity  is  the  corner-stone  of  his  system,  and 
its  rejection  would  be  the  demolition  of  that 
system. 

His  art  criticism  is  radically  and  irretrievably 
wrong.  That  which  makes  art  what  it  is,  as  art, 
has  absolutely  nothing  to  do  with  the  phenomena 
of  nature.  Even  limiting  the  term  Art  to  that 
form  of  it  embraced  in  Design,  this  is  true.  The 
end  of  art,  as  art,  is  decoration;  and  the  earliest, 
as  well  as  some  of  the  most  exquisite  decoration  we 
know  of,  is  in  combination  of  forms  and  colours 
which  are  not  borrowed  from  nature.  Some  of  the 
best  art  in  the  world  is  devoted  to  the  invention 
of  purely  conventional  forms  for  purely  decorative 
purposes,  and  in  decorative  work  any  attempt  at 
distinct  naturalism  is  at  once  felt  as  degrading  the 
decoration.  One  day  that  Ruskin  and  myself  were 
discussing  the  theory  of  art,  he  asked  me  to 
formulate  one.  I  complied,  with  this,  "Art  is  the 
harmonic  (rhythmic  or  melodic)  expression  of 
human  emotion."  He  expressed  himself  so  pleased 
with  it  that  he  asked  permission  to  give  it  in  a  note 
to  one  of  the  later  volumes  of  "  Modern  Painters," 


96  JOHN  RUSKIN 

which  he  was  then  passing  through  the  press.  It 
never  appeared.  On  second  thought,  he  doubtless 
perceived  that  it  clashed  with  the  expressions  he 
had  employed  in  the  work.  Art  does  not  lie  in 
representing  nature,  but  in  the  manner  of  repre 
senting  her,  and  may  equally  be  employed  in 
invented  and  conventional  forms,  as  in  repeating 
hers.  Naturalism  and  art  are  the  eternal  antithesis 
— as  one  rises  the  other  sinks  in  the  scale  of  the 
general  results.  No  art  can  be  gauged  by  its 
fidelity  to  nature  unless  we  admit  in  that  term  the 
wider  sense  which  makes  nature  of  the  human 
soul  and  all  that  is — the  sense  of  music,  the  per 
ception  of  beauty,  the  grasp  of  imagination,  "  the 
light  that  never  was,  on  sea  or  land,"  as  well  as 
that  which  serves  the  lens  of  the  photographer; 
and  Ruskin's  own  work,  his  teaching  in  his  classes, 
and  his  application  of  his  own  standards  to  all 
great  work,  show  that  he  understands  the  term 
"  fidelity  to  nature "  to  mean  the  adherence  to 
physical  facts,  the  scientific  aspects  of  nature. 
Greek  art  he  never  has  really  sympathised  with, 
nor  at  heart  accepted  as  supreme,  though  years 
after  he  took  the  position  he  never  has  avowedly 
abandoned,  he  found  that  in  Greek  coinage  there 
were  artistic  qualities  of  the  highest  refinement; 
but  Watts  has  told  me  that  Ruskin  expressed  his 
surprise  that  the  artist  could  keep  before  him  so 
ugly  a  thing  as  the  Oxford  Venus,  a  cast  of  which 
was  in  his  studio,  and  that  he  pronounced  the  horse 
an  animal  devoid  of  all  beauty.  In  my  opinion,  he 
cares  nothing  for  the  plastic  qualities  of  art,  or  for 


JOHN  RUSKIN  97 

the  human  figure,  otherwise  than  as  it  embodies 
human  and  moral  dignity.  The  diverse  and  in 
congruous  criticisms  he  makes  on  Titian,  Michael 
Angelo,  and  Raphael,  put  side  by  side  with  his 
notes  on  Holman  Hunt,  on  George  Leslie  and  Miss 
Thompson  in  the  Royal  Academy,  and  Miss 
Alexander's  drawings,  show  his  appreciation  of 
figure  art  to  be  absolutely  without  any  criterion 
of  style  or  motive  in  figure  painting,  if  this  were 
not  already  apparent  from  his  contradictions  at 
different  periods  of  his  life.  These  are  puzzling  to 
the  casual  reader.  When  he  says,  in  the  early  part 
of  "Modern  Painters,"  that  the  work  of  Michael 
Angelo  in  general,  the  Madonna  di  San  Sisto,  and 
some  other  works  are  at  the  height  of  human 
excellence,  and  later  demolishes  poor  Buonarotti 
like  a  bad  plaster  cast,  and  sets  Raphael  down  as  a 
mere  posturer  and  dexterous  academician,  one  is  at 
a  loss  to  reconcile  his  opinions  with  any  standard. 
The  fact,  I  believe  to  be,  that  his  early  art  education, 
which  was  in  great  part  due  to  J.  D.  Harding,  a 
painter  of  high  executive  powers  and  keen  appre 
ciation  of  technical  abilities  in  the  Italian  painters, 
was  in  the  vein  of  orthodox  standards ;  that  while 
under  the  influence  of  his  reverence  for  his  teachers 
he  accepted  the  judgment  which  they,  in  common 
with  most  artists,  have  passed  on  the  old  masters ; 
but  that  when  left  to  himself,  with  no  kind  of  sym 
pathy  with  ideal  figure  art,  nor,  I  believe,  with  any 
form  of  figure  art  as  such,  but  with  a  passion  for 
landscape,  a  curious  enthusiasm  for  what  is  minute 
and  intense  in  execution,  and  an  over-weening 

G 


98  JOHN  RUSKIN 

estimate  of  his  own  standards  and  opinions,  he 
gradually  lost  all  this  vicarious  appreciation,  and 
retained  of  his  admiration  of  old  art  only  what  was 
in  accordance  with  his  own  feelings — i.e.)  the  in 
tensity  of  moral  and  religious  fervour,  and,  above 
all,  anything  that  savoured  of  mysticism,  the  ascetic 
and  didactic,  especially  the  art  of  the  schools  of 
religious  passion.  This  was  due  to  the  profound 
devotional  feeling  which  was  the  basis  of  his 
intellectual  nature.  He  said  to  me  once  that  he 
was  a  long  time  in  doubt  whether  he  should  give 
himself  to  the  church  or  to  art.  So  far  as  the 
world  is  concerned  I  think  he  took  the  wrong  road. 
In  the  church  he  might  not  have  been,  as  his  father 
hoped,  a  bishop,  for  his  views  have  been  too 
individual  for  church  discipline,  but  I  believe  he 
would  have  produced  a  more  beneficial  effect  on 
his  age  than  if  he  had  been.  As  an  art  critic  he 
has  been  like  one  writing  on  the  sea-sands:  his 
system  and  his  doctrines  of  art  are  repudiated  by 
every  thoughtful  artist  I  know.  Art  in  certain 
forms  touches  him  profoundly  but  only  emotion 
ally.  Although  he  drew  earnestly  for  years,  he 
never  seemed  to  understand  style  in  drawing, 
master  as  he  is  of  style  (sui  generis)  in  language; 
his  perception  of  colour  is  so  deficient  that  he 
appears  to  me  unable  to  recognise  the  true  optical 
colour  of  any  object ;  that  is,  its  colour  in  sunshine 
as  distinguished  from  its  colour  in  shadow  or  its 
local  colour;  and  in  painting  from  nature  he  is 
always  best  pleased  with  what  is  most  like  Turner. 
I  painted  or  sketched  with  him  during  a  summer  in 


JOHN  RUSKIN  99 

Switzerland,  and  therefore  I  do  not  speak  from  a 
moral  consciousness.  What  he  most  admired  in 
my  work,  and  sought  in  his  own,  was  excessive 
elaboration  and  photographic  fidelity,  and  he  did 
not  easily  apprehend  the  larger  relations  of  the 
landscape.  He  used  to  wonder  at  my  getting  over 
the  detail  so  fast;  but  he  always  got  angry  with 
the  work  when  I  reached  a  point  where  I  found 
it  necessary  to  bring  the  masses  into  relation 
according  to  my  own  ideas.  At  Chamonix  I  one 
day  began  a  large  study  of  the  Mer  de  Glace  from 
opposite  the  glacier,  looking  up  it  with  the  Aiguille 
de  Dru  in  the  centre  of  the  distance.  The  whole 
subject  was  rapidly  laid  in  in  general  effect  until 
it  got  down  to  the  foreground,  where  I  began 
finishing  elaborately,  to  his  entire  satisfaction, 
which  continued  for  several  days,  and  until  I 
pointed  out  to  him  a  difficulty  which  it  puzzled  me 
to  get  over  without  violating  the  topographical 
fidelity  of  the  study.  There  were  several  of  the 
main  lines  of  the  distance  which  formed  approxi 
mately  radii  from  a  point  of  no  importance  in  the 
composition.  He  had  not  noticed  it ;  but  when  I 
pointed  it  out  he  got  into  a  state  of  vexation,  and, 
declaring  that  nothing  could  be  done  with  a  subject 
which  had  such  an  awkward  accident  in  it,  insisted 
on  my  giving  up  the  study,  saying  he  would  not 
stay  in  Chamonix  for  me  to  finish  it.  As  I  was  his 
guest  I  complied  with  his  wish,  and  we  left  the 
valley  the  next  day. 

This    capriciousness    is    a    characteristic    of    the 
man.     In  spite  of  the  womanly  tenderness  of  his 


100  JOHN  RUSKIN 

nature,  which  is,  when  favourably  moved,  of  a 
kindliness  which  measures  no  sacrifice,  he  is 
capable,  under  impulse,  of  treating  a  friend  of 
one  day  with  the  most  contemptuous  aversion  on 
the  next,  for  some  whim  no  more  important  than 
that  which  drove  us  out  of  Chamonix. 

There  is  in  his  character  a  curious  form  of  in 
dividuality,  so  accentuated  and  so  imperious  that 
it  produces  in  him  the  sense  of  his  own  infallibility. 
He  once  wrote  of  his  opinions  as  not  matters 
of  opinion  but  as  positive  knowledge ;  yet,  in 
personal  intercourse,  one  finds  nothing  of  the  dog 
matism  which  is  so  notable  a  feature  in  his 
writing.  He  listened  to  all  objections,  and  often 
acknowledged,  during  discussion,  the  inconse 
quence  of  his  conclusions ;  and  during  the  long 
and  vigorous  debates  which  occupied  our  Swiss 
evenings,  he  not  infrequently  admitted  error,  but 
on  the  next  day  held  the  old  ground  as  firmly 
as  ever.  His  intellect,  with  all  its  power  and 
intensity,  is  of  the  purely  feminine  type.  The 
love  of  purity ;  the  quick,  kindly,  and  unreasoning 
impulse;  the  uncompromising  self-sacrifice  when 
the  feeling  is  on  him,  and  the  illogical  self- 
assertion  in  reaction  when  it  has  passed;  the 
passionate  admiration  of  power;  the  wayward 
ness  and  often  inexplicable  fickleness — all  are 
there.  But  behind  all  these  feminine  traits  there 
is  the  no  less  feminine  quality  of  passionate  love 
of  justice,  flecked,  on  occasions  of  personal  impli 
cation,  with  acts  of  great  injustice ;  there  is  a 
general  inexhaustible  tenderness,  with  occasional 


JOHN  RUSKIN  101 

instances  of  absolute  cruelty.  Any  present  judg 
ment  of  him,  as  a  whole,  is  difficult  if  not  impos 
sible,  because  there  are  in  him  several  different 
individuals,  and  the  perspective  in  which  we  now 
see  them,  makes  of  his  position,  as  an  art  teacher, 
the  most  prominent  element  of  his  personality; 
whereas,  in  my  persuasion,  his  art  teaching  is, 
in  his  own  nature  and  work,  subordinate  to  his 
moral  and  humanitarian  ideals.  He  always  saw 
art  through  a  religious  medium,  and  this  made 
him,  from  the  beginning,  strain  his  system  of 
teaching  and  criticism  to  meet  the  demand  of 
direct  truth  to  nature,  the  roots  of  his  enthusiasm 
and  reverence  being  not  in  art  but  in  nature,  and 
in  her  beneficial  influence  on  humanity. 

A  little  incident  of  our  Alpine  summer  will 
illustrate  this  view  of  his  character  better  than 
all  my  appreciations.  During  our  stay  at  Geneva 
he  had  some  mountain  drawing  to  do  at  the  Perte 
du  Rhone,  and  asked  me  to  drive  down  with  him. 
Not  far  from  the  point  of  view  which  he  had 
selected  was  a  group  of  wretched  dwellings,  mis 
called  cottages,  but  which  in  America  they  call 
shanties;  not  the  picturesque  wall  -  and  -  thatch 
structures  which  the  word  cottage  calls  up  in 
England,  but  built  of  boards,  shabby  without 
being  picturesque,  and,  to  my  American  notions, 
only  capable  of  association  with  poverty  and  dis 
comfort.  Ruskin  asked  me  to  draw  them  while 
he  was  drawing  the  mountains.  The  subject  was 
anything  but  attractive  or  pictorial,  and  though  it 
should  have  been  enough  for  me  that  he  wished  me 


102  JOHN  RUSKIN 

to  draw  it  carefully,  I  only  obeyed  my  own  feeling 
and  made  a  careless  ten  minutes'  pencil  drawing,  all 
the  thing  was  worth  to  me.  When  Ruskin  drove 
up  to  take  me  in  on  the  way  back  to  Geneva  and 
saw  what  I  had  done,  he  was — and,  I  must  say, 
with  good  reason — offended  at  the  indifferent  way 
in  which  I  had  complied  with  his  request,  and,  after 
a  few  reproachful  words,  threw  himself  back  in 
the  carriage  in  a  sullen  temper.  I  replied  that 
the  subject  did  not  interest  me,  and  that  the  prin 
cipal  feeling  I  had  in  looking  at  it  was  that  it 
must  be  a  wretched  home  for  human  beings,  and 
promised  more  fevers  than  anything  else;  and 
that,  in  short,  I  did  not  think  it  worth  drawing. 
Nothing  more  was  said  by  either  of  us  until  we 
had  driven  half-way  back  to  Geneva,  when  he 
broke  out  with,  "You  are  right,  Stillman,  about 
those  cottages ;  your  way  of  looking  at  them  was 
nobler  than  mine,  and  now,  for  the  first  time  in 
my  life,  I  understand  how  anybody  can  live  in 
America."  It  has  always  seemed  to  me  that  this 
was  a  true  epitome  of  the  man's  nature — first,  the 
aesthetic  outside  view  of  the  matter,  then  the 
humanitarian,  overpowering  it;  the  womanish 
pettishness,  and  the  generous  admission  of  his 
error  when  seen;  and,  after  this  confession,  his 
greater  cordiality  to  me  —  for  he  always  valued 
more  any  one  who  brought  him  a  new  idea, 
though  he  often  broke  friendship  with  those  who 
differed  from  him  too  strongly. 

Besides  this  absorbing  passion  for  the  spiritual 
ideal,  the  mental  constitution  whose  compass  was 


JOHN  RUSKIN  103 

set  to  the  immovable  pole  of  the  most  exalted 
morality,  he  had  a  curious  facility  for  seeing 
art  as  he  wished  to.  He  saw  through  his  feelings 
and  prepossessions,  and  even  looking  at  nature 
he  only  saw  certain  things,  and  those  in  general 
through  his  predisposition.  So  he  always  held 
Turner  true  although  the  thing  he  saw  was  false. 
In  one  drawing,  where  Turner  has  given  the  full 
moon  rising  in  cool  night-mists  at  the  left  of  the 
picture  and  the  sun  setting  golden  at  the  right, 
Ruskin  explains  it  as  intended  to  be  two  pictures. 
He  praises  Turner  for  mingled  effects  of  sunlight 
and  moonlight  when  he  ought  to  know  that  the 
full  moon  will  cast  no  shadow  until  the  sun  has 
set  nearly  or  quite  an  hour.  Turner  continually 
puts  figures  in  full  light  in  the  foreground  of  a 
picture  which  has  the  sun  setting  in  the  view,  the 
shadows  on  the  figures  being  consequently  on  the 
side  nearest  the  sun,  yet  Ruskin  has  never 
admitted  the  painter's  indifference  to  the  facts  of 
nature. 


II 

To  the  world  at  large  Ruskin's  reputation,  even 
as  an  art  critic,  rests  on  the  first  volume  of  his 
"Modern  Painters."  Very  few  people  have  read 
the  second  volume,  and  fewer  still  the  whole  five, 
though  the  early  editions  have  been  sold  and 
others  since.  Of  this  first  volume,  what  most 
impressed  the  general  public  was  not  the  sound 
ness  of  his  views  of  art,  of  which  it  could  not 


104  JOHN  RUSKIN 

judge  at  all,  or  his  knowledge  of  nature,  of  which 
it  could  judge  but  little,  but  his  eloquence,  his  mag 
nificent  diction.  Take,  for  instance,  the  following 
from  the  comparison  of  Turner  with  Poussin,  which 
every  reader  of  the  book  will  remember  as  what 
is  called  a  "  word  picture  "  of  extraordinary  power : 

"But  as  I  climbed  the  long  slopes  of  the  Alban  mount, 
the  storm  swept  finally  to  the  north,  and  the  noble  outline 
of  the  domes  of  Albano,  and  the  graceful  darkness  of  its 
ilex  grove  rose  against  pure  streaks  of  alternate  blue  and 
amber,  the  upper  sky  gradually  flushing  through  the  last 
fragments  of  rain-cloud  in  deep,  palpitating  azure,  half 
ether  and  half  dew.  The  noonday  sun  came  slanting 
down  the  rocky  slopes  of  La  Riccia,  and  its  masses  of 
entangled  and  tall  foliage,  whose  autumnal  tints  were  mixed 
with  the  wet  verdure  of  a  thousand  evergreens,  were  pene 
trated  with  it  as  with  rain.  I  cannot  call  it  colour,  it  was 
conflagration.  Purple,  and  crimson,  and  scarlet,  like  the  curtains 
of  God's  tabernacle,  the  rejoicing  trees  sank  into  the  valley  in 
showers  of  light,  every  separate  leaf  quivering  with  bouyant  and 
burning  life,  each,  as  it  turned  to  reflect  or  to  transmit  the  sun 
beam,  first  a  torch  and  then  an  emerald.  Far  up  into  the 
recesses  of  the  valley,  the  green  vistas  arched  like  the  hollows 
of  mighty  waves  of  some  crystalline  sea,  with  the  arbutus  flowers 
dashed  along  their  flanks  for  foam,  and  silver  flakes  of  orange 
spray  tossed  into  the  air  around  them,  breaking  over  the  gray  walls 
of  rock  into  a  thousand  separate  stars,  fading  and  kindling  alter 
nately  as  the  weak  wind  lifted  or  let  them  fall.  Every  glade  of 
grass  burned  like  the  golden  floor  of  heaven,  opening  in 
sudden  gleams  as  the  foliage  broke  and  closed  above  it  as 
sheet  lightning  opens  in  a  cloud  at  sunset ;  the  motionless  masses  of 
dark  rock — dark  though  flushed  with  scarlet  lichen — casting  their 
quiet  shadows  across  its  restless  radiance,  the  fountain  under 
neath  them  filling  its  marble  hollow  with  blue  mist  and 
fitful  sound,  and,  over  all,  the  multitudinous  bars  of  amber 


JOHN  RUSKIN  105 

and  rose,  the  sacred  clouds  that  have  no  darkness,  and  only 
exist  to  illumine,  were  seen  in  fathomless  intervals,  between 
the  solemn  and  orbed  repose  of  the  stone  pines  passing  to 
lose  themselves  in  the  last  white,  blinding  lustre  of  the 
measureless  line,  where  the  Campagna  melted  into  the  blaze 
of  the  sea." 

Magnificent  this  is  as  rhetoric,  but,  if  intended 
to  show  the  shortcomings  of  Poussin  or  the 
attainments  of  Turner,  it  is  as  exaggerated  for 
one  as  it  is  unfair  for  the  other;  for  the  effects 
there  described  are  no  more  in  the  power  of 
colour  than  in  the  feeling  of  either  of  those  artists. 
It  is  not  nature-painting  at  all;  neither  true  to 
the  sense  nor  to  the  details  of  nature.  As  mastery 
of  the  English  language  I  shall  not  attempt  to 
criticise  it,  but  as  statement  of  what  is  to  be  seen 
in  nature  or  rendered  in  art  it  bears  about  the 
same  relation  to  the  most  ideal  and  orchestral 
effects  of  Turner  as  those  do  to  sober  nature.  I 
have  put  in  italics  certain  expressions  to  which 
I  ask  the  grave  critical  attention  of  the  reader.  I 
leave  out,  for  the  moment,  the  singular  topo 
graphical  inaccuracies  which,  in  a  work  devoted 
to  truth  of  nature,  ought  to  claim  some  attention ; 
but,  in  such  a  work,  we  may  ask  the  sober  meaning 
of  such  expressions  as  "Purple,  and  crimson,  and 
scarlet,  like  the  curtains  of  God's  tabernacle"; 
"Every  separate  leaf  quivering  with  buoyant  and 
burning  life,  each,  as  it  turned  to  reflect  or  to 
transmit  the  sunbeam,  first  a  torch  and  then  an 
emerald";  the  rocks  "dark  though  flushed  with 
scarlet  lichen— casting  their  quiet  shadows  across 


106  JOHN  BUSKIN 

its  restless  radiance  "  [why  restless  radiance,  except, 
like  much  else  in  the  passage,  for  alliteration?]. 
The  colour  epithets,  to  an  artist,  only  express  a 
crudity  of  pigment  as  unlike  Turner  as  nature; 
the  "arbutus  flowers  dashed  along  their  flanks" 
.  .  .  "silver  flakes  of  orange  spray  [dreamed  of 
from  some  other  locality,  for  neither  exists  at 
Aricia]  tossed  into  the  air  around  them  .  .  .  into 
a  thousand  separate  stars";  and  "every  separate 
leaf,"  show  as  great  contempt  for  the  possibilities 
of  painting  in  the  rendering  of  detail  for  the 
human  eye  as  indifference  to  the  aims  of  land 
scape  painting,  either  according  to  Poussin  or 
Turner.  The  "Purple,  and  crimson,  and  scarlet, 
like  the  curtains  of  God's  tabernacle,"  is  apocalyp 
tic,  not  naturalistic,  and  the  entire  passage,  when 
we  consider  that  it  is  part  of  an  essay  intended 
to  advocate  the  close  adherence  to  the  facts  of 
nature  in  landscape  painting,  can  only  be  put 
aside  as  passing  legitimate  criticism  or  justifiable 
comparison.  It  is  safe  to  say  that,  of  a  thousand 
landscape  painters  and  amateurs  habituated  to 
look  at  nature,  taking  the  best  and  the  most 
trivial,  not  one  who  had  passed  by  Aricia  would 
recognise  as  fact  a  single  characteristic  of  the 
description  by  Ruskin.  I  know  the  place  better 
than  I  do  London  or  New  York,  and  am  confident 
in  saying  that  neither  in  the  ensemble  nor  in  the 
detail  is  there  anything  there  which  Ruskin 
imagines  he  saw.  Much  is  mere  sound,  allitera 
tion  which  is  in  place  in  poetry  but  not  in  art 
criticism,  and  much  only  the  expression  of  vague 


JOHN  RUSKIN  107 

imaginings  far  less  like    nature    than    the    great 
scenic  compositions  of  John  Martin. 

Take  another  instance  from  the  section  on  the 
sea  ("Truth  of  Water,"  this  being  the  description 
of  a  picture,  the  Slave  Ship).  Again  I  italicise 
the  passages  to  which  I  wish  to  call  attention 
as  demanding  analysis  and  criticism. 

"  It  is  a  sunset  on  the  Atlantic  after  prolonged  storm ;  but 
the  storm  is  partially  lulled,  and  the  torn  and  streaming 
rain-clouds  are  moving  in  scarlet  lines  to  lose  themselves  in  the 
hollow  of  the  night.  The  whole  surface  of  the  sea  included  in 
the  picture  is  divided  into  two  ridges  of  enormous  swell,  not 
high  nor  local,  but  a  broad  heaving  of  the  whole  ocean  like 
the  lifting  of  its  bosom  by  deep-drawn  breath  after  the 
torture  of  the  storm.  Between  these  two  ridges  the  fire  of 
the  sunset  falls  along  the  trough  of  the  sea,  dyeing  it  with 
an  awful  but  glorious  light,  the  intense  and  lurid  splendour  of 
which  burns  like  gold  and  bathes  like  blood.  .  .  .  Purple  and 
blue  the  lurid  shadows  of  tlie  hollow  breakers  are  cast  on  the  mist 
of  the  night,  which  gathers  cold  and  low,  advancing  like  the  shadow 
of  death  upon  the  guilty  ship  as  it  labours  amidst  the  lightning 
of  the  sea,  its  thin  masts  written  upon  the  sky  in  lines  of 
blood  girded  with  condemnation  in  that  fearful  hue  which  signs 
the  sky  with  horror,  and  mixes  its  flaming  flood  with  the  sunlight, 
and,  cast  far  along  tlie  desolate  heave  of  the  sepulchral  waves,  in 
carnadines  the  multitudinous  sea.  I  believe,  if  I  were  reduced  to 
rest  Turner's  claim  to  immortality  upon  any  single  work,  I 
should  choose  this.  Its  daring  conception — ideal  in  the  highest 
sense  of  the  word — is  fused  on  the  purest  truth  and  wrought  out 
with  the  concentrated  knowledge  of  a  life  .  .  .  and  the  whole 
picture  is  dedicated  to  the  most  sublime  of  subjects  and  impres 
sions — (completing  thus  the  perfect  system  of  all  truth  which 
we  have  shown  to  be  formed  by  Turner's  works) — the  power, 
majesty,  and  deathfulness  of  the  open,  deep,  illimitable  sea." 


108  JOHN  RUSKIN 

"Burns  like  gold  and  bathes  like  blood"  is,  of 
course,  again  for  alliteration;  "Purple  and  blue 
the  lurid  shadows,"  etc.,  part  for  the  sing  of  the 
sentence  and  part  poetic  imagination  utterly  un- 
suggested  and  unsuggestable  by  painting;  "that 
fearful  hue,"  etc.,  to  "  multitudinous  sea,"  is  simply 
fine  writing  which,  when  it  conveys  a  false  im 
pression,  or  no  impression  legitimate  to  its  pro 
fessed  purpose,  is  a  literary  vice,  as  it  is  in  this 
case,  where  the  purpose  is  the  description  of  a 
picture. 

Ruskin  supposes  this  picture  to  be  an  attempt 
to  pourtray  the  deep  sea,  but  neither  he  nor  Turner 
was  ever  out  of  soundings :  how  should  one  paint, 
or  the  other  recognise,  the  fathomless  as  distin 
guished  from  the  shallow  seas?  The  fact  is,  that 
the  sea  in  the  Slave  Ship  is  a  long  ground- 
swell,  resembling  the  watery  mountains  one  may 
see  on  the  open  Atlantic  no  more  than  the  water 
below  a  rapid.  This  form  of  swell  and  the 
"hollow  breakers"  are  never  found  except  when 
the  sea  is  shoaling.  In  the  deep  Atlantic,  after 
a  long  gale,  such  as  Ruskin  supposes  (I  have  seen 
it  at  its  worst  once  only  in  70,000  miles,  more  or 
less,  of  ocean  travel  by  sail  and  steam),  the  great 
waves  lift  to  heights  such  that  Turner's  Slave 
Ship  would  be  hidden  between  two  of  them. 
They  hang  over  you  like  impending  doom;  and, 
just  when  you  think  that  the  ship  must  be  buried 
in  five  seconds,  the  forefoot  of  the  wave  reaches 
you,  and  the  ship  suddenly  begins  to  rise,  and 
in  another  five  seconds  you  are  on  the  summit 


JOHN  RUSKIN  109 

looking  out  over  the  heaving  expanse  —  black, 
save  as  it  is  foam-driven,  fitfully  rising  and 
falling,  apparently  without  law  or  order  —  and, 
after  being  poised  an  instant,  you  feel  the  ship 
going  from  under  you  again;  your  breath  almost 
leaves  you  with  the  rapidity  of  the  descent,  and 
you  are  buried  once  more  in  the  deep  trough  of 
the  sea  for  another  brief  space.  Out  of  the 
flanks  of  these  great  waves  jump  and  start,  fit 
fully  and  unaccountably,  lesser  hillocks,  to  drop 
and  disappear  again;  but,  when  the  crest  of  one 
conies  towards  you,  you  see  no  hollow  breaker, 
for  the  crest  simply  pitches  forward  and  slides 
down  the  slope — there  is  no  combing. 

Then,  as  to  truth,  Turner's  whole  picture  is  a 
flagrant  falsehood.  The  most  gorgeous  colours 
of  a  sunset  are  in  it  painted  in  a  sky  where  the 
sun  has  still  half  an  hour  or  more  to  sink  to  the 
horizon  ;  and  this  license  the  artist  habitually 
took,  although,  as  every  artist  knows,  these 
colours  never  come  till  after  the  sun  is  below 
the  horizon.  A  suggestion  of  them  is  given  by  a 
winter  sunset  in  the  smoke  of  London,  but  there 
is  not  the  least  suggestion  of  the  chromatic  scale 
Turner  uses.  Lowell  used  to  say  that  Turner 
learned  to  paint  sunsets  in  London ;  but  the 
London  smoke  sunset  is  a  display  in  tonality 
more  like  Cuyp  than  Turner,  sometimes  gorgeous 
but  never  brilliant  colour.  Cuyp  was  a  tonalist, 
Turner  a  colourist,  and  Turner  in  the  Slave 
Ship  reached  the  highest  attainment  I  know  in 
colour  orchestration.  The  picture  is  in  a  flame  of 


110  JOHN  RUSKIN 

sunset  colours ;  but,  in  the  lower  left-hand  corner, 
is  a  bit  of  blue  and  white,  the  American  flag, 
which,  like  the  blare  of  a  trumpet  in  a  florid 
passage  of  music,  throws  the  whole  scheme  into 
a  startling  contrast.  The  clouds  are  not  the 
"  torn  and  streaming  rain-clouds "  of  an  after- 
storm  sky,  but  full-bellied,  rolling  wind-clouds,  so 
far  as  they  are  structurally  true  to  anything ; 
subtly  modelled  and  modulated,  but,  as  a  whole,  as 
utterly  impossible  a  sky  as  the  sea  is  an  utterly 
impossible  sea.  It  is  a  marvellous  picture :  I  do 
not  yield  to  Ruskin  in  admiration  of  it  as  art,  or 
admire  it  less  for  its  daring  license  and  contempt 
of  nature's  details;  one  can  only  say  that  it  is 
magnificent,  but  it  is  not  nature.  Ruskin's 
feeling  as  to  art  may  have  been,  au  fond, 
correct;  but  it  was  so  disturbed  and  perverted  by 
his  theories  and  the  settled  conviction  that  art 
was  simply  the  uncompromising  rendering  of 
nature  as  she  appears  to  the  bodily  vision,  that 
he  left  out  of  all  consideration  the  subjective* 
transformation  of  natural  truth  which  is  the 
basis  of  art;  or,  if  he  reckoned  it  in,  it  was  to 
persuade  himself  that  it  was  due  to  a  peculiarity 
of  vision  in  the  painter.  It  is  impossible  to 
reconcile  all  the  inconsistencies  into  which  this 
theory  led  him;  such  as  the  exaltation  of  painters 
who  were  mere  naturalists,  like  Brett,  or  utterly 
unimaginative  realists,  like  Holman  Hunt,  and 
the  extraordinary  judgment  which  he  pronounced 

*  I  remember  that  he  used  to  express  the  strongest  abhorrence  of  the 
terms  "subjective"  and  "objective"  as  German  nonsense. 


JOHN  RUSKIN  111 

on  Millais  in  his  pamphlet  on  Pre-Raphaelitism 
— which  phase  of  art  he  desired  to  consider  the 
consequence  of  his  teaching,  though,  as  I  have 
heard  Rossetti  say,  none  of  the  Brotherhood  had 
ever  read  ten  pages  of  his  writing  before  Ruskin 
had  constituted  himself  their  advocate.  In  some 
respects  this  little  book  may  be  considered  the 
summing  up  of  his  art  teachings,  and  the 
violence  done  to  logic  and  art  alike  in  his  parallel 
between  Millais  and  Turner  is  the  clearest  state 
ments  of  his  errors  we  possess.  The  function  of 
the  painter  is  here  defined  clearly  and  chiefly  to 
be  topographer  and  historian. 

"Suppose  that,  after  disciplining  themselves  so  as  to  be 
able  to  draw  with  unerring  precision  each  the  particular 
kind  of  subject  in  which  he  most  delighted,  they  had 
separated  into  two  great  armies  of  historians  and  natura 
lists;  that  the  first  had  painted  with  absolute  faithfulness 
every  edifice,  every  city,  every  battle-field,  every  scene  of 
the  slightest  historical  interest,  precisely  and  completely 
rendering  their  aspect  at  the  time;  and  that  their  com 
panions,  according  to  their  several  powers,  had  painted  with 
like  fidelity  the  plants  and  animals,  the  natural  scenery  and 
the  atmospherical  phenomena  of  every  country  on  the 
earth ;  suppose  that  a  faithful  and  complete  record  were 
now  in  our  museums  of  every  building  destroyed  by  war, 
or  time,  or  innovation  during  these  last  200  years;  suppose 
that  each  recess  of  every  mountain  chain  of  Europe  had 
been  penetrated  and  its  rocks  drawn  with  such  accuracy 
that  the  geologist's  diagram  was  no  longer  necessary; 
suppose  that  every  tree  of  the  forest  had  been  drawn  in 
its  noblest  aspect,  every  beast  of  the  field  in  its  savage 
life — that  all  these  gatherings  were  already  in  our  national 
galleries,  and  that  the  painters  of  the  present  day  were 


112  JOHN  RUSKIN 

labouring  happily  and  earnestly  to  multiply  them  and  put 
such  knowledge  more  and  more  within  reach  of  the  common 
people — would  not  that  be  a  more  honourable  life  for  them 
than  gaining  precarious  bread  by  '  bright  effects '  ? " 

One  may  reply,  safely  enough,  that  such  a  life 
is  honourable  in  the  sense  that  it  is  honest,  but 
if  the  honour  is  that  of  which  artists  are  most 
ambitious,  it  is  equally  safe  to  say  that  there 
is  very  little  of  it  to  be  gained  in  that  life.  And 
this  method  of  study  has  always  been  the  basis 
of  Ruskin's  instruction  —  instruction  for  this 
and  other  reasons  utterly  wasted  so  far  as  the 
proper  cultivation  of  art  is  concerned.  I  re 
member  how,  when  Ruskin's  drawing-book  was 
published,  an  artist  —  whose  feeling  for  all  the 
nobler  qualities  of  art  I  have  rarely  known 
equalled,  and  a  personal  friend  and  admirer  of 
Ruskin,  said  to  me,  "He  should  not  have  printed 
that ;  we  know  now  just  what  he  does  not  know." 
It  is  not  so  much  that  he  ignores  the  greater 
gifts,  but  that  he  conceives  that  they  can  be 
trained  or  developed  by  this  kind  of  ant-like  pro 
ceeding — going  over  the  earth  as  an  insect,  not 
even  as  a  bird.  But  it  is  in  the  comparison 
of  the  two  painters  whom  he  chooses  as  types 
that  we  most  clearly  recognise  the  failure  to 
distinguish  between  the  two  forms  of  so-called 
art. 

"Suppose,  for  instance,  two  men,  equally  honest,  equally 
industrious,  equally  impressed  with  a  humble  desire  to  render 
some  part  of  what  they  saw  in  nature  faithfully,  and  other 
wise  trained  in  convictions  such  as  I  have  above  endeavoured 


JOHN  RUSKIN  113 

to  induce.  But  one  of  them  is  quiet  in  temperament,  has  a 
feeble  memory,  no  invention,  and  excessively  keen  sight. 
The  other  is  impatient  in  temperament,  has  a  memory  which 
nothing  escapes,  an  invention  which  never  rests,  and  is  com 
paratively  near-sighted.  Set  them  both  free  in  the  same 
field  in  a  mountain  valley.  One  sees  everything,  small  and 
large,  with  almost  the  same  clearness ;  mountains  and  grass 
hoppers  alike ;  the  leaves  on  the  branches,  the  veins  on  the 
pebbles,  the  bubbles  in  the  stream;  but  he  can  remember 
nothing  and  invent  nothing.  Patiently  he  sets  himself  his 
mighty  task;  abandoning  at  once  all  thought  of  seizing 
transient  effects,  or  giving  general  impressions  of  that  which 
his  eyes  present  to  him  in  microscopical  dissection,  he 
chooses  some  small  portion  out  of  the  infinite  scene,  and 
calculates  with  courage  the  number  of  weeks  which  must 
elapse  before  he  can  do  justice  to  the  intensity  of  his  percep 
tions  or  the  fullness  of  matter  in  his  subject.  Meanwhile, 
the  other  has  been  watching  the  change  of  the  clouds  and 
the  march  of  the  light  along  the  mountain-sides ;  he  beholds 
the  whole  scene  in  broad,  soft  masses  of  true  gradation,  and 
the  very  feebleness  of  his  sight  is  in  some  sort  an  advantage  to  him 
in  making  him  more  sensible  of  the  aerial  mystery  of  distance  and 
hiding  from  him  the  multitudes  of  circumstances  which  it  would  have 
been  impossible  for  him  to  represent.  ...  I  have  supposed  the 
feebleness  of  sight  in  this  last  and  of  invention  in  the  first 
painter,  that  the  contrast  between  them  may  be  the  more 
striking;  but  with  very  slight  modification  both  the  char 
acters  are  real.  Grant  to  the  first  considerable  inventive 
power  with  exquisite  sense  of  colour,  and  give  to  the 
second,  in  addition  to  all  his  other  faculties,  the  eye  of 
an  eagle,  and  the  first  is  John  Everett  Millais,  the 
second  Joseph  Mallord  William  Turner."  "And  thus  Pre- 
Raphaelitism  and  Raphaelitism  and  Turnerism  are  all  one 
and  the  same  thing,  so  far  as  education  can  influence 
them;  they  are  different  in  their  choice,  different  in  their 
faculties,  but  all  the  same  in  this,  that  Raphael  himself,  so 

H 


114  JOHN  BUSKIN 

far  as  he  was  great,  and  all  who  preceded  or  followed  him 
who  ever  were  great,  became  so  by  painting  the  truths  around 
them  as  they  appeared  to  each  man's  mind,  not  as  he  had 
been  taught  to  see  them  except  by  the  God  who  made  both 
him  and  them." 

And  yet,  between  the    first  and  last  sentences 
which    I    have    quoted,    the    author    has    gone 
through    a  detailed  account  of   the   development 
of   Turner's    art,    showing    that    it    was    a   con 
tinuous     evolution     of     conventional     forms     of 
treatment  borrowed   from    earlier   painters.      He 
is  obliged,  to  complete  his  antithesis,  to  suppose 
Turner   feeble  of   sight,  because    he  could  in  no 
other  way  consistent  with  his  theory  (and  every 
thing  is  always  bent  to  his  theories)  account  for 
his   ignoring    "the    multitudes    of    circumstances 
which    it   would    have    been    impossible   for    him 
to  represent,"  whereas  the  simple  fact  was  that 
Turner  had,  as  he  afterwards  admits,  an  eagle's 
eye,  and  simply  ignored  whatever  in  nature  did 
not  suit  his  purpose.     Turner  was  bred  on  con 
ventions  ;    he   began    in    the    style    of    the    men 
about  him,  Girtin  and  his  kind;  he  went  through 
the    schools    of    Loutherbourg,    Poussin,    Claude, 
Vandervelde,  imitating  everybody  except  the  most 
naturalistic  of  the  Dutchmen,  but  never  from  the 
beginning    to    the    end    of    his    career    painting 
from   nature,  or   in   any   other   way   than   from 
memory,  and  always   in    a  conventional  manner 
very    much    influenced    by    the    early    landscape 
painters  of  the  true  subjective  school,  to  which 
he  belonged  in  character,  faculties,  and  method; 


JOHN  RUSKIN  115 

while  Millais  was  a  naturalist,  who  had  no 
invention,  no  idealism,  but  was  always  working 
imitatively,  and  from  direct  vision,  which  Turner 
never  did.  Turner  was  influenced,  and  happily, 
by  Claude  to  the  last  day  of  his  life,  though 
not  always  obeying  the  influence  to  the  same 
apparent  degree. 

Of  Ruskin  the  writer,  aside  from  the  art 
critic,  it  is  surely  superfluous  for  me  to  say  any 
thing:  for  mastery  of  our  language,  the  greater 
authorities  long  ago  have  given  him  his  place; 
the  multitude  of  petty  critics  and  pinchbeck 
rhetoricians,  who  pay  him  the  tribute  of  tawdry 
imitation,  is  the  ever-present  testimony  to  his 
power  and  masterhood.  Probably  no  prose 
writer  of  this  century  has  had  so  many  choice 
extracts  made  from  his  writings — passages  of 
gorgeous  description,  passionate  exhortation,  path 
etic  appeal,  or  apostolic  denunciation;  and  cer 
tainly  no  one  has  so  moulded  the  style  of  all  the 
writers  of  a  class  as  he,  for  there  scarcely  can 
be  found  a  would-be  art  critic  who  does  not 
struggle  to  fill  his  throat  with  Ruskin's  thunders, 
so  that  a  flood  of  Ruskin — and  water — threatens 
all  taste  and  all  study  of  art.  As  an  example 
of  his  diction  take  the  description  of  "Schaff- 
hausen  " : 

"  Stand  for  half  an  hour  beside  the  Fall  of  Schaffhausen, 
on  the  north  side  where  the  rapids  are  long,  and  watch  how 
the  vault  of  water  first  bends,  unbroken  in  pure  polished 
velocity,  over  the  arching  rocks  at  the  brow  of  the  cataract, 
covering  them  with  a  dome  of  crystal  twenty  feet  thick,  so 


116  JOHN  RUSKIN 

swift  that  its  motion  is  unseen  except  when  a  foam  globe 
from  above  darts  over  it  like  a  falling  star;  and  how  the 
trees  are  lighted  above  it  under  all  their  leaves  at  the 
instant  that  it  breaks  into  foam ;  and  how  all  the  hollows  of 
that  foam  burn  with  green  fire  like  so  much  shattering 
chrysoprase ;  and  how  ever  and  anon,  startling  you  with  its 
white  flash,  a  jet  of  spray  leaps  hissing  out  of  the  fall  like 
a  rocket,  bursting  in  the  wind  and  driven  away  in  dust, 
filling  the  air  with  light;  and  how,  through  the  curdling 
wreaths  of  the  restless  crashing  abyss  below,  the  blue  of  the 
water,  paled  by  the  foam  in  its  body,  shows  purer  than  the 
sky  through  white  rain-cloud ;  while  the  shuddering  iris  stoops 
in  tremulous  stillness  over  all,  fading  and  flushing  alternately 
through  the  clioking  spray  and  shattered  sunshine,  hiding  itself 
at  last  among  the  thick  golden  leaves,  which  toss  to  and  fro 
in  sympathy  with  the  wild  water;  their  dripping  masses, 
lifted  at  intervals,  like  sheaves  of  loaded  corn,  by  some 
stronger  gush  from  the  cataract,  and  bowed  again  upon  the 
mossy  rocks  as  its  roar  dies  away;  the  dew  gushing  from 
their  thick  branches  through  drooping  clusters  of  emerald 
herbage,  and  sparkling  in  white  threads  along  the  dark  rocks  of 
the  shore,  feeding  the  lichens  which  chase  and  chequer  them  with 
purple  and  silver." 

In  the  expression  of  what  may  be  seen  in  a 
waterfall,  and  the  suggestion  of  what  may  be 
felt,  but  seen  by  no  bodily  eye,  is  there  any 
thing  in  our  language  that  is  comparable  to 
this?  But  is  it  fair  to  ask  art  to  realise  it? 
Who  shall  paint  "the  shuddering  iris  fading  and 
flushing  alternately  through  the  choking  spray 
and  shattered  sunshine?"  It  is  beyond  the 
province  of  art  to  emulate  this  vein  of  feeling, 
as  much  as  to  paint  Shelley's  "flames  mingling 
with  sunset."  But  how  many  hapless  phaetons 


JOHN  RUSKIN  117 

has  our  Apollo  of  the  pen  thus  sent  tumbling 
down  on  us,  entangled  in  their  "predicates  and 
six,"  or  sixty!  Description  a  la  Ruskin  has 
become  a  disease  of  the  literature  of  the  gener 
ation,  and  your  novelist  coolly  stops  you  in  the 
crisis  of  his  story  to  describe  a  sunset  in  two 
or  three  pages  which,  when  all  is  said,  compare 
with  Ruskin  as  a  satyr  with  Hyperion. 


Ill 

THUS  Ruskin  obstinately  bent  all  his  con 
clusions  and  observations  to  his  doctrines — what 
he  wanted  to  see  he  saw,  nothing  else.  The 
summer  before  one  of  my  early  visits  to  England, 
I  had  painted  a  picture  in  what  I  believed  the 
spirit  of  his  teachings,  being  then  one  of  the 
most  enthusiastic  of  his  disciples.  I  had  con 
ceived  a  death-struggle  between  a  hunter  and  a 
buck,  in  which  they  had  fallen  together  over  a 
ledge  of  rock  and  lay  in  death  at  its  foot.  I  had 
searched  the  forest  around  where  I  camped  in 
the  Adirondacks  until  I  found  the  ledge  which 
suited  the  conception,  and  painted  it  carefully, 
with  the  red  sunset  light  coming  aslant  through 
the  forest  and  falling  on  the  perpendicular  cliff, 
at  the  foot  of  which  was  a  dense,  dank  growth 
of  ferns,  all  painted  on  the  spot  and  in  the 
sunset  light.  At  the  foot,  where  they  would  fall, 
I  put  my  guide,  locked  with  a  huge  buck,  and 
painted  them  as  carefully  as  I  knew  how — the 
man  from  life  and  the  buck  immediately  after  I 


118  JOHN  RUSKIN 

had  killed  him.     I  took  it  with   me   to  London, 
and   one   day  Ruskin   came  into  my  studio,  and, 
seeing  the   picture,   exclaimed  with   a  gesture  of 
disgust,  "Why  do  you  have  this  stinking  carrion 
in  your  picture?    Put  it  out,  it's  filthy,  it  stinks!" 
etc.      I    was    too    much    under    his    influence    to 
weigh  his  judgment  against  mine,  and  painted  it 
out   accordingly.     Dante   Rossetti,   who  had  seen 
and  liked  the  picture  as  it  was,  coming  in  again 
a   few   days    after,   exclaimed,   "What   have   you 
done    to    your    picture  ? "   I    explained,    and    with 
strong     irritation     in     his     manner    he     replied, 
"  You  've     spoiled     your     picture,"     and     walked 
straight  out  of  the  room.    I  had  spoiled  it;  for 
everything    in   it    had    been    chosen   and   painted 
with   reference    to  this   deadly  duel,  with   which 
Ruskin  had  no  sympathy.    Death  oppressed  him, 
whence  his  annoyance  with  the  picture;  but  that 
he    was    olfactorily    impressed,  as    he    was,  could 
only  be   explained  by  the    fact    that,  as   always, 
he  felt  what  he  imagined  or  wished  to  see.     He 
wanted  to  see  truth  in  Turner's  drawings,  and  he 
made  his  truth  accordingly.    I  can  but  regard  his 
influence  on   modern   landscape   painting  as   per 
nicious  from  beginning  to  end ;  and,  coinciding  as 
it  did  with  the  advent  of  a  great  naturalistic  and, 
therefore,  anti-artistic    tendency   in   all    branches 
of   study,  it    was    even   more   disastrous    than  it 
would  have  been  in  ordinary  circumstances. 

His  architectural  work,  "  Stones  of  Venice,"  etc., 
I  am  not  so  competent  to  judge,  but  I  believe 
that,  while  on  the  one  hand  he  did  great  good  by 


JOHN  RUSKIN  119 

bringing   out   the  virtues   of   Gothic    architecture 
and  awakening  the  interest  of  the  world  in  the 
art  that  was  passing  away,  on  the  other  hand  he 
did    harm    by    repressing    the    influence    of    the 
better  form  of  Renaissance,  which  is  often  of  the 
noblest  and  truest  art,  and  is  far  more  adapted 
.to  our  modern  ways  of  work  and  uses  than  is  the 
Gothic.     He  uses  here  the  same  bitter  polemics 
and  biased  judgment  as  in  the  "Modern  Painters." 
In    the    lovely   little   Renaissance    church    of    the 
Miracoli  at  Venice,  where  are  the  most  exquisite 
decorations  in  that  style  of  which  I  know,  Ruskin 
finds  among  the  arabesques  a  chilcFs  head  tied  by 
its    locks   among   the   tendrils   of   the  vegetation, 
and  inveighs  bitterly  against  the  brutality  of  such 
a  conception  as   putting   a   bodiless   head   in   the 
decoration.    But  he  never  stops  to  see  that  it  is 
a  cherub  among  other  cherubim,  and  that,  as  it 
is    in   the    character    of   the   cherub   to   have   no 
body,  the  tying  of  one  of  them  by  the  hair  to 
the   vine    is    only   a    bit   of    playful  invention   in 
which    there    is   no    brutality  whatever,  but    the 
most  seraphic  of  practical  jokes  on  the  bodiless 
and  helpless  state  of  the  charming  little  creature ; 
a  creature  which,  in  Gothic  days,  might  have  been 
believed  in  as  an  actuality,  but  which  the  Renais 
sance   only  looked  at  as   a  fiction  of  mythology 
with  the  Tritons  and  Sirens,  and  therefore  with 
no  reverence.    But  with  Greek  art,  all  that  in  any 
way    sympathised    with    its    dominant    character 
meets  his  anathema.    It  seems  to  me  that  even 
in  architecture  his  influence   is  not  catholic,  but 


120  JOHN  RUSKIN 

is  tinged  by  his  devotional  tendencies,  although 
he  introduces  an  element  of  common  sense  into 
the  criticism  of  architecture  unknown  before 
him. 

But  Ruskin's  true  position  is  higher  than  that 
of  art  critic  in  any  possible  development.  It  is 
as  a  moralist  and  a  reformer,  and  in  his  passion 
ate  love  of  humanity  (not  inconsistent  with 
much  bitterness,  and  even  unmerited,  at  times, 
to  individual  men)  that  we  must  recognise  him. 
His  place  is  in  the  pulpit,  speaking  largely  and 
in  the  unsectarian  sense.  Truth  is  multiform, 
but  of  one  essence,  and,  such  as  he  sees  it,  he  is 
always  faithful  to  it.  I  have  taken  large  ex 
ception  to  his  ideas  and  teachings  in  respect  to 
art  because  I  feel  that  they  are  misleading.  His 
mistakes  in  art  are  in  some  measure  due  to  his 
fundamental  mistake  of  measuring  it  by  its 
moral  powers  and  influence,  and  the  roots  of 
the  error  are  so  deeply  involved  in  his  character 
and  mental  development  that  it  can  never  be 
uprooted.  It  is  difficult  for  me  (perhaps  for  any 
of  his  contemporaries)  to  judge  him  as  a  whole; 
because,  besides  being  his  contemporary  and  a 
sufferer  by  what  I  now  perceive  to  be  the  fatal 
error  of  his  system,  I  was  for  so  many  years 
his  close  personal  friend ;  and  because,  while  I 
do  not  agree  with  his  tenets  and  am  obliged  by 
my  own  sense  of  right  to  combat  many  of  his 
teachings,  I  still  retain  the  personal  affection 
for  him  of  those  years  which  are  dear  to  mem 
ory,  and  reverence  the  man  as  I  know  him;  and 


JOHN  RUSKIN  121 

because  I  most  desire  that  he  should  be  judged 
rightly — as  a  man  who,  for  moral  greatness,  has 
few  equals  in  his  day,  and  who  deserves  an 
honour  and  distinction  which  he  has  not  re 
ceived,  and  in  a  selfish  and  sordid  world  will 
not  receive,  but  which  I  believe  time  will  give 
him  —  that  of  being  one  who  gave  his  whole 
life  and  substance  to  the  furtherance  of  what  he 
believed  to  be  the  true  happiness  and  elevation 
of  his  fellow-men.  Even  were  he  the  sound 
art  critic  so  many  people  take  him  to  be,  his 
real  nature  rises  above  that  office  as  much  as 
humanity  rises  above  art.  When  we  wish  to 
compare  him  with  men  of  his  kind,  it  must  be 
with  Plato  or  Savonarola  rather  than  with  Hazlitt 
or  Hamerton.  Art  cannot  be  clearly  estimated 
in  any  connection  with  morality,  and  Ruskin 
could  never,  any  more  than  Plato  or  Savonarola, 
escape  the  condition  of  being  in  every  fibre  of 
his  nature  a  moralist  and  not  an  artist,  and  as 
he  advanced  in  life  the  ethical  side  of  his  nature 
more  and  more  asserted  its  mastery,  though  less 
and  less  in  theological  terms. 

If  I  have  assumed  the  right  to  pass  judgment 
on  his  art  teachings,  it  is  because  I  have  devoted 
most  of  my  life  to  the  study  of  art  and  more 
years  than  Ruskin  had  when  he  finished  his 
most  important  books;  but  when  I  come  to  the 
moral  problem,  so  vast,  so  profound  and  moment 
ous  in  comparison  with  any  questions  of  culture, 
I  have  not  the  presumption  to  judge  a  man 
whose  moral  nature  I  know  to  be  so  exceptional, 


122  JOHN  RUSKIN 

and  winged  to  flights  that  I  can  only  honour 
from  below.  Here  we  enter  into  a  world  where 
only  the  Judge  of  all  life  can  pronounce  and 
where  my  opinion  must  be  respectful,  for  the 
unquestionable  loftiness  and  unselfishness  of  his 
nature,  and  the  consecration  of  his  life  to  the 
advancement  of  truth  as  he  has  seen  it,  give 
him,  to  me,  an  authority  I  dare  not  debate  with, 
and  which  I  insist  on  all  the  more  because  I 
know  the  world  does  not  accord  it  to  him.  No 
one  has  yet  dared  answer  Pilate,  and  I  have  no 
disposition  to  judge  whether  Ruskin's  social  re 
forms  and  political  theories  are  hi  accordance 
with  eternal  truth  or  not — whether  they  are 
practical  or  not  is,  perhaps,  a  question  of  epoch 
simply. 

As  an  indication  of  Ruskin's  position — more 
free,  possibly,  because  more  personal  than  those 
given  in  his  early  works — I  quote  part  of  one 
of  his  first  letters  to  me  (about  1851).  I  had 
been  involved  in  mystical  speculation,  partly 
growing  out  of  the  second  volume  of  "Modern 
Painters,"  and  had  written  to  him  for  counsel. 

"  I  did  not,  indeed,  understand  the  length  to  which  your 
views  were  carried  when  I  saw  you  here,  or  I  should  have 
asked  you  much  more  about  them  than  I  did ;  and  your 
present  letter  leaves  me  still  thus  far  in  the  dark  that  I  do 
not  know  whether  you  only  have  a  strong  conviction  that 
there  is  such  a  message  to  be  received  from  all  things,  or 
whether  in  any  sort  you  think  you  have  understood  and  can 
interpret  it,  for  how  otherwise  should  your  persuasion  of 
the  fact  be  so  strong?  I  never  thought  of  such  a  thing 
being  possible  before,  and  now  that  you  have  suggested  it 


JOHN  RUSKIN  123 

to  me  I  can  only  imagine  that  by  rightly  understanding  as 
much  of  the  nature  of  everything  as  ordinary  watchfulness 
will  enable  any  man  to  perceive,  we  might,  if  we  looked  for 
it,  find  in  everything  some  special  moral  lesson  or  type  of 
particular  truth,  and  that  then  one  might  find  a  language  in 
the  whole  world  before  unfelt  like  that  which  is  forever 
given  to  the  ravens  or  to  the  lilies  of  the  field  by  Christ's 
speaking  of   them.      This,  I   think,  you  might  very   easily 
accomplish  so  far  as  to  give  the  first  idea  and  example ;  then 
it  seems  to  me  that  every  thoughtful  man  who  succeeded 
you  would  be  able  to  add  some  types  or  words  to  the  new 
language,  but  all  this  quite  independently  of  any  Mystery 
in  the  Thing  or  Inspiration  in  the  Person,  any  more  than 
there  is  Mystery  in  the  cleaning  of  a  Room  covered  with 
dust — of  which  you  remember  Bunyan  makes  so  beautiful  a 
spiritual  application,  so   that  one  can   never  more   see  the 
thing  done  without  being  interested.      If  there  be  mystery 
in  things  requiring  revelation,  I  cannot  tell  on  what  terms 
it  might  be  vouchsafed  us,  nor  in  any  way  help  you  to  greater 
certainty  of  conviction,  but  my  advice  to  you  would  be  on 
no  account    to  agitate    nor    grieve   yourself    nor    look  for 
inspiration — for  assuredly  many  of  our  noblest  English  minds 
have  been  entirely  overthrown  by  doing  so — but  to  go  on 
doing  what  you  are  quite  sure  is  right ;  that  is,  striving  for 
constant  purity  of  thought,  purpose  and  word :  not  on  any 
account  overworking  yourself — especially  in  headwork — but 
accustoming  yourself   to   look  for  the   spiritual  meaning  of 
things  just  as  easily  to  be  seen  as  their  natural  meaning; 
and  fortifying  yourself  against  the  hardening  effect  of  your 
society,  by  good  literature.      You  should   read   much — and 
generally  old  books ;  but  above  all  avoid  German  books — and 
all  Germanists  except  Carlyle,  whom  read  as  much  as  you 
can    or    like :     read     George    Herbert    and     Spenser    and 
Wordsworth   and   Homer,   all   constantly;    Young's    "Night 
Thoughts,"  Crabbe — and,  of  course,  Shakespeare,  Bacon  and 
Jeremy  Taylor  and  Bunyan ;  do  not  smile  if  I  mention  also 


124  JOHN  RUSKIN 

"  Robinson  Crusoe  "  and  the  "  Arabian  Nights,"  for  standard 
places  on  your  shelves.  I  say  read  Homer :  I  do  not  know 
if  you  can  read  Greek,  but  I  think  it  would  be  healthy  work 
for  you  to  teach  it  to  yourself  if  you  cannot,  and  then  I 
would  add  to  my  list  Plato — but  I  cannot  conceive  a  good 
translation  of  Plato.  I  had  nearly  forgotten  one  of  the  chief 
of  all — Dante.  But  in  doing  this,  do  not  strive  to  keep 
yourself  in  an  elevated  state  of  spirituality.  No  man  who 
earnestly  believed  in  God  and  the  next  world  was  ever 
petrified  or  materialised  in  heart,  whatever  society  he  kept. 
Do  whatever  you  can,  however  simple  or  commonplace,  in 
your  art;  do  not  force  your  spirituality  on  your  American 
friends.  Try  to  do  what  they  admire  as  well  as  they  would 
have  it,  unless  it  cost  you  too  much — but  do  not  despise 
it  because  commonplace.  Do  not  strive  to  do  what  you  feel 
to  be  above  your  strength.  God  requires  that  of  no  man. 
Do  what  you  feel  happy  in  doing:  mingle  some  physical 
science  with  your  imaginative  studies ;  and  be  sure  that  God 
will  take  care  to  lead  you  into  the  fulfilment  of  whatever 
tasks  he  has  ready  for  you,  and  will  show  you  what  they 
are  in  his  own  time. 

"  Thank  you  for  your  sketch  of  American  art.  I  do  hope 
that  your  countrymen  will  look  upon  it,  in  time,  as  all 
other  great  nations  have  looked  upon  it  at  their  greatest 
times,  as  an  object  for  their  united  aim  and  strongest  efforts. 
I  apprehend  that  their  deficiency  in  landscape  has  a  deep 
root — the  want  of  historical  associations.  Every  year  of  your 
national  existence  will  give  more  power  to  your  landscape 
painting — then,  do  you  not  want  architecture  1  Our  chil 
dren's  taste  is  fed  with  Ruins  of  Abbeys.  I  believe  the 
first  thing  you  have  to  do  is  to  build  a  few  Arabic  palaces  by 
way  of  novelty — one  brick  of  jacinth  and  one  of  jasper.  .  .  . 

"Write  to  me  whenever  you  are  at  leisure  and  think  I 
can  be  of  use  to  you — with  sympathy  or  in  any  way,  and 
believe  me  always  interested  in  your  welfare  and  very 
faithfully  yours,  J.  RUSKIN." 


JOHN  RUSKIN  125 

I  could  not  quote  from  his  published  works  so 
condensed  a  summary  of  the  creed  of  the  man: 
it  maintains  the  supremacy  of  the  moral  element 
which  has  obtained  in  his  life-work  taken  as  a 
whole. 

That  comparatively  few  people  have  read  the 
"Fors  Clavigera"  I  know,  for,  having  occasion  to 
complete  my  set  not  long  since,  I  found  that 
several  of  the  numbers  supplied  me  by  the 
publisher  were  from  the  first  thousand,  published 
years  ago;  and  yet,  this  is  the  work  which  more 
than  any  other  gives  us  a  clear  insight  into  the 
character  and  mental  tendencies  of  Ruskin.  He 
is  here  at  his  ease,  not  bound  by  any  preposses 
sions  and  theories;  wayward,  outspoken,  indif 
ferent  to  praise  or  blame;  speaking  with  full 
possession  of  himself  and  frank  appreciation  of 
his  audience,  addressing  himself  "  to  the  workmen 
and  labourers  of  Great  Britain,"  not  so  much  in 
the  hope  that  they  would  come  to  fill  his  school, 
but  because  he  knew  that  only  by  the  poor  and 
the  despised  by  the  great  world  was  there  any 
hope  of  the  reconstruction  of  society,  as  he 
dreamed  it,  being  effected  or  accepted.  The  drift 
of  all  Ruskin's  preaching  (and  I  use  the  word  in 
its  noble  sense)  is  a  protest  against  materialism 
in  ourselves,  impurity  in  our  studies  and  desires, 
and  selfishness  in  our  conduct  towards  our  fellow- 
men. 

He  considers  himself  the  pupil  of  Carlyle — for 
me,  he  floats  in  a  purer  air  than  Carlyle  ever 
breathed.  As  a  feminine  nature  he  was  capti- 


126  JOHN  BUSKIN 

vated  by  the  robust  masculine  force  of  his  great 
countryman,  and  there  was,  in  the  imperial  theory 
of  Carlyle,  much  that  chimed  with  Ruskin's  own 
ideas  of  human  government.  The  Chelsean,  re 
gretfully  looking  back  to  the  day  of  absolutism 
and  brutal  domination  of  the  appointed  king,  was, 
in  a  certain  sense,  a  sympathetic  reply  to  Ruskin's 
longings  for  a  firm  and  orderly  government  when 
he  felt  the  quicksands  of  the  transitional  order 
of  the  day  yielding  under  his  feet ;  but,  in  reality, 
the  two  regarded  Rule  from  points  as  far  re 
moved  from  each  other  as  those  of  Luther  and 
Voltaire.  Carlyle's  ideal  was  one  of  a  Royal 
Necessity,  an  incarnate  law  indifferent  to  the 
crushed  in  its  marchings  and  rulings  —  burly, 
brutal,  contemptuous  of  the  luckless  individual 
or  the  overtaken  straggler;  his  Rule  exists  not 
for  the  sake  of  humanity,  but  for  that  of  Order, 
as  if  Order  and  Rule  were  called  out  for  their 
own  sake;  he  puffs  into  perdition  the  trivial 
details  of  individual  men,  closing  accounts  by 
ignoring  the  fractions.  Ruskin  loses  sight  of  no 
detail,  but  calls  in  to  the  benefit  of  his  Order 
and  Rule  every  child  and  likeness  of  a  child  in 
larger  form,  full  of  a  tenderness  which  is  utterly 
human  yet  inexhaustible.  Carlyle's  Ruler  is  like 
a  Viking's  god,  his  conception  utterly  pagan; 
Ruskin's  is  Christlike ;  Carlyle's  word  is  like  the 
mace  of  Charlemagne,  Ruskin's  like  the  sword  of 
the  Angel  Gabriel ;  if  Ruskin  is  notably  egotistical, 
Carlyle  is  utterly  selfish ;  if  Ruskin  dogmatises  like 
an  Evangelist,  Carlyle  poses  as  a  Prophet;  and 


JOHN  BUSKIN  127 

the  difference,  when  we  come  to  sum  up  all  the 
qualities,  moral,  intellectual,  and  literary,  seems 
to  me  to  be  in  favour  of  Ruskin.  Their  ideals 
are  similarly  antithetical  —  Ruskin's  lying  in  a 
hopeful  future,  an  unattainable  Utopia,  perhaps, 
but  still  a  blessed  dream;  Carlyle's  in  a  return 
to  a  brutal  and  barren  past,  made  forever  impos 
sible  by  the  successful  assertion  of  human  indi 
viduality,  and  for  whose  irrevocability  we  thank 
God  with  all  our  hearts  and  in  all  hope  of  human 
progress.  The  public  estimate  has  not  overrated 
Ruskin,  just  as  he  had  not  overrated  Turner, 
because  the  aggregate  impression  of  power  re 
ceived  was  adequate  to  the  cause;  but  in  the  one 
case,  as  in  the  other,  the  mistake  has  been  relative, 
and  consisted  in  mis-estimating  the  genius  and 
attributing  the  highest  value  to  the  wrong  item 
in  the  aggregate.  I  may  be  mistaken  in  my 
estimate  of  Ruskin,  but  I  believe  that  the  future 
will  exalt  him  above  it  rather  than  depress  him 
below  it. 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

IT  has  been  repeatedly  said  in  my  hearing,  by 
men  who  had  come  to  know  Lowell  personally, 
after  having  known  his  works,  that  he  was  better 
than  anything  he  had  done.  No  one  knew  this 
so  well  as  those  who  knew  him  best.  I  made 
my  acquaintance  with  his  works  in  the  days  of 
early  artistic  enthusiasms,  when  I  used  to  visit 
the  studio  of  William  Page,  the  poet's  intimate 
friend  and  ardent  admirer,  to  whose  almost 
inspired  (oracular,  certainly)  improvisations  on 
art  and  poetry  I  used  to  listen  till  my  young 
blood  ran  quick,  and  my  own  enthusiasms  made 
me  see  what  was  never  to  be  seen  again,  even  in 
dreams.  Page  used  to  recite  Lowell's  poems 
with  his  own  commentary,  so  subtly  fantastic  at 
times  that  it  made  one  think  he  had  taken  part  in 
the  composition  of  the  poet's  text,  or  thought  he 
had,  at  least.  I  only  remember  as  then  in  print 
the  volume  of  early  poems,  and  the  Sir  Launfal  in 
a  small  separate  volume.  There  was  much  in  the 
poems  which  appealed  powerfully  to  the  green 
and  sentimental  stage  of  mental  growth  in  which 
I  then  was,  and  I  learned  most  of  them  by  heart, 
together  with  the  Sir  Launfal.  I  spent  the 
following  autumn  at  a  lighthouse  on  the  coast 
of  New  England,  studying  the  sea  in  its  multi- 

128 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         129 

form  phases,  and  the  two  volumes  were  all  the 
literature  I  carried  with  me.  But  I  remember 
saying,  about  that  time,  to  a  common  friend  of 
Page  and  myself,  that  the  author  wanted  only 
the  ripening  of  a  great  sorrow  to  bring  out  his 
greater  powers.  The  poems  seemed  to  me,  even 
then,  only  the  overflow  of  a  mind  so  full  of  poetic 
thought  that  verse  flowed  from  it  as  water  from 
a  deep  spring,  giving  out  what  would  run  to 
waste  if  not  turned  to  some  direct  use. 

It  was  not  long  after  this  that  my  criticism 
was  to  be  tested  by  life.  Lowell's  wife  died, 
leaving  him  in  that  gloom  from  which  came  the 
series  of  short  poems,  to  my  mind  the  best  ex 
pression  of  the  finest  side  of  the  man's  nature — 
"The  Wind-Harp,"  "Auf  Wiedersehen,"  "Palinode," 
"  Ode  to  Happiness,"  and  "  The  Dead  House,"  * — 
expressions  of  the  passion  of  bereavement  at 
work  in  a  strong  and  healthy  nature,  not  crushed, 
but  bowed  down;  for  he  was  under  the  influence 
of  a  sane  and  elastic  sorrow  which  did  not 
paralyse,  but  turned  his  mental  activity  to  the 
presentation  of  the  overpowering  passion,  genuine, 
pure,  and  without  a  trace  of  the  artifice  or 
inflation  of  the  aftermath  of  grief.  The  only 
thing  that  I  know  in  English  poetry  which  affects 
me  similarly,  is  the  "Break,  break,  break"  of 

*  There  are,  amongst  the  poems  written  previous  to  this  date,  two 
which  are  of  the  same  passion,  and  due  to  the  death  of  his  little 
daughter  Rose.  But  even  in  those  there  is  a  measure  of  restraint, 
as  if  the  bereavement  were  tempered  by  participation.  They  do  not 
go  to  the  very  depths  of  the  man's  nature  as  do  the  "  Wind-Harp " 
and  "  Ode  to  Happiness." 

I 


130         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

Tennyson,  and  there  the  freshness  of  passion  has 
given  place  to  the  consciousness  of  art  and  the 
study  of  form.  It  was  in  this  phase  of  his  life 
that  I  made  Lowell's  acquaintance. 

I  was  about  commencing  the  publication — in 
company  with  John  Durand,  son  of  a  former 
president  of  the  Academy  of  Design — of  an  art 
journal,  The  Crayon,  and  went  to  Cambridge 
to  solicit  the  assistance  of  those  writers  whose 
work  in  any  way  sympathised  with  the  object  of 
our  journal.  If  I  remember  rightly,  I  had  no 
letter  of  introduction,  but  presented  myself  on 
the  strength  of  my  mission,  and  was  received  by 
Lowell  with  the  princely  courtesy  which  was  his 
manner.  I  was  full  of  my  project,  which  seemed 
to  me,  in  my  enthusiasm,  evangelical;  for  I  was 
set  to  preach  and  labour  for  the  revival  of  art, 
and  he  accepted  me  on  my  own  ground,  with 
entire  sympathy.  One  of  his  letters,  written  a 
little  later,  when  our  acquaintance  had  ripened 
into  friendship,  has  such  a  significance  as  a  revela 
tion  of  the  state  of  his  mind  at  that  time,  that 
I  do  not  believe  I  need  apologise  for  introducing 
it,  though  it  is  very  personal  to  me;  it  would 
not  tell  its  story  if  I  left  out  the  personal  part. 
I  wanted  something  of  his  for  the  opening 
number  of  the  paper,  and  he  had  sent  me  a 
passage  from  his  "Pictures  from  Appledore," 
which  he  entitled  "August  Afternoon."  I  wanted 
him  to  be  on  board  at  "the  launch,"  and  I  had 
also  a  poem  of  Bryant's,  that  called  "A  Rain 
Dream"  in  his  published  volume;  but  the  scheme 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          131 

of  the  journal  did  not  admit  more  than  one  such 
notable  contribution  in  each  number,  so  I  had  to 
choose  between  Bryant  and  Lowell  as  the  poet 
of  the  occasion.  It  is  to  this  that  he  alludes  in 
the  letter. 

GKUB  STREET,  1th  Dec'r,  1854. 

MY  DEAR  SIR, — I  am  sorry  to  have  kept  your 
proofs  so  long,  but  I  was  absent  from  home  the 
day  they  came. 

I  don't  know  now  whether  I  sent  you  the  right 
part  of  the  poem,  but  I  wished  to  give  you  the 
most  paletty  part  first;  and  I  am  now  so  over 
whelmed  with  lectures  and  Grub  Street  that  I 
have  literally  not  time  to  copy  the  introductory 
verses  describing  the  island.  But,  my  dear  sir, 
if  Bryant  has  given  you  a  poem,  you  should  put 
that  in  your  first  number,  by  all  means.  It  will 
do  you  more  good  than  many  of  mine,  and  your 
first  duty  is  to  your  Crayon-child,  wherever  you 
are  not  obliged  to  sacrifice  any  principle  to  it. 
Don't  mind  me  in  the  least,  /wish  your  journal 
to  succeed.  Remember  that  success  is  the  only 
atmosphere  through  which  your  ideas  will  look 
lovely  to  the  public  you  wish  to  influence.  Bryant's 
name  will  help  you  more  than  mine;  therefore, 
take  him  first.  Not  that  I  like  to  give  up  my 
place  on  board  at  the  launch,  either,  for  I  am 
sure  it  will  be  a  graceful  one. 

You  mustn't  talk  of  Christmas  gifts  and  things. 
I  shall  think  you  mean  to  keep  me  in  Grub  Street 
in  spite  of  myself.  [I  had  intended  to  send  his 
daughter  something  for  Christmas,  and  suppose 


132         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

I  must  have  asked  some  question  about  her  tastes.] 
I  positively  will  not  be  paid  in  any  way,  if  I  may 
say  so  after  being  more  than  paid  by  your  beauti 
ful  drawings,  which  M.  likes  as  well  as  I  do,  and 
declares  a  preference  for  the  larger  one,  "  On  the " 

I  can't  make  out  the  name,  but  I  shall  call  it 

the  Lethe,  that  drowsy  water  with  tree-dreams 
in  it,  so  smooth  and  sleek  and  soaked  with  sun, 
it  seems  a  drink  of  it  would  quench  the  thirst  of 
all  sad  memories.  Only,  no  Lethe  can,  for  we  are 
our  own  saddest  memories — a  hundred  a  day. 
I  thank  you  for  them  most  heartily,  and  for 
your  letter  as  well. 

I  am  glad  you  had  a  pleasant  time  here.  / 
had,  and  you  made  me  fifteen  years  younger 
while  you  stayed.  When  a  man  gets  to  my  age, 
enthusiasms  don't  often  knock  at  the  door  of  his 
garret.  I  am  all  the  more  charmed  with  them 
when  they  come.  A  youth  full  of  such  pure 
intensity  of  hope  and  faith  and  purpose,  what 
is  he  but  the  breath  of  a  resurrection-trumpet  to 
us  stiffened  old  fellows,  bidding  us  up  out  of  our 
clay  and  earth  if  we  would  not  be  too  late? 

Your  inspiration  is  still  to  you  a  living  mistress ; 
make  her  immortal  in  her  promptings  and  her 
consolations  by  imaging  her  truly  in  art.  Mine 
looks  at  me  with  eyes  of  paler  flame  and  beckons 
across  a  gulf.  You  came  into  my  loneliness  like 
an  incarnate  aspiration.  And  it  is  dreary  enough 
sometimes;  for  a  mountain  peak,  on  whose  snow 
your  foot  makes  the  first  mortal  print,  is  not  so 
lonely  as  a  room  full  of  happy  faces  from  which 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          133 

one  is  missing  forever.  This  was  originally  the 
fifth  stanza  of  "The  Wind-Harp": 

"  0  tress  that  so  oft  on  my  heart  hath  lain, 
Rocked  to  rest  within  rest  by  its  thankful  beating, 
Say,  which  is  harder, — to  bear  the  pain 
Of  laughter  and  light,  or  to  wait  in  vain, 
'Neath  the  unleaved  tree,  the  impossible  meeting  ? 
If  Death's  lips  be  icy,  Life  gives,  I  wis, 
Some  kisses  more  clay-cold  and  darkening  than  his  ! " 

Forgive  me,  but  you  spoke  of  it  first.  [I  had  in 
a  letter  spoken  of  "The  Wind-Harp,"  which  he 
had  read  to  me,  on  my  visit  already  alluded  to,  in 
its  then  incomplete  state.] 

I  have  done  better  than  send  you  a  poem;  I 
have  got  you — a  subscriber.  On  this  momentous 
topic  I  shall  enlarge  no  further  than  to  say  that 
I  wish  to  be  put  on  your  list  also  in  my  capacity 
as  gentleman,  and  not  author.  I  will  not  be  dead 
headed.  I  respect  my  profession  too  much.  .  .  . 

Heartily  and  hopefully  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

It  is  forty -five  years  since  that  letter  was 
written,  but  I  can  never  read  it  again  without 
the  reflection,  pale  though  it  be,  of  the  pathos 
which  rests  on  that  visit  to  his  study  when  he 
read  me  "  The  Wind-Harp,"  and  we  sat  silent  long 
into  the  twilight  of  the  autumn  day,  the  bare 
boughs  of  the  elm-trees  outside  his  windows 
cutting  against  the  sky;  and  his  little  daughter 
came  in  after  her  lessons.  When  she  left  the 
room,  I  spoke  of  the  delicate  chiselling  of  her 


134         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

features,    and    he    replied    by    pointing    to    her 
mother's  portrait  on  the  study  wall. 

Perhaps  I  overrate  my  own  way  of  looking  at 
Lowell,  but  in  that  letter  there  seems  the  ex 
pression  of  his  character,  writ  large.  Out  of  the 
depth  of  the  shadow  over  his  life,  in  the  solitude 
of  his  study,  with  nothing  but  associations  of  his 
wrecked  happiness  permitted  around  him,  the 
kindly  sympathy  with  a  new  aspiration  wakened 
him  to  a  momentary  gaiety,  his  humour  flashed 
out  irrepressible,  and  his  large  heart  turned  its 
warmest  side  to  the  new  friend,  who  came  only 
to  make  new  calls  on  his  benevolence ;  that  is,  to 
give  him  another  opportunity  to  bestow  himself 
on  others.  There  is  in  it  the  generosity,  the 
pathos,  the  subtle  humour,  the  worldly  wisdom, 
and  the  self-forgetfulness  which  we  who  knew 
him  recognise,  drawn  against  the  dark  back 
ground  of  his  bereaved  life.  There  was  in  Lowell 
no  distinction  to  be  found  between  the  man  and 
the  poet.  What  he  wrote  he  felt.  No  line  of  his 
but  was  the  glow  of  what  he  felt  and  acted  to 
his  fellow-men.  It  is  possible,  therefore,  that  for 
us  who  knew  him,  and  to  whom  his  sunny  nature 
showed  its  warmest  side,  it  is  impossible  to  see 
his  work  as  it  will  be  seen  by  those  who  did  not 
know  him.  It  would  be  quite  impossible  for  me 
to  criticise  Lowell's  work  as  I  could  that  of  a 
man  I  never  knew;  the  halo  of  his  personality 
surrounds  the  object  of  criticism  and  makes  the 
critical  vision  indistinct.  I  loved  the  man  with 
a  passion  no  other  man  had  ever  awakened  in 


135 

me,  one  which  often  recalled  to  me  the  love  of 
David  for  Jonathan. 

The  letter,  at  this  long  distance,  confounds 
itself  with  the  visit  which  preceded  it.  I  had 
stayed  with  him  at  Elmwood,  and  we  had  talked 
of  many  things  which  provoke  confidence,  had 
visited  his  favourite  bits  of  landscape  in  the 
classic  fields,  Beaver  Brook,  the  Waverley  Oaks, 
etc.,  and,  in  the  dusk  of  the  day,  chance,  or  some 
spiritual  induction,  had  led  him  into  speaking  of 
his  griefs,  charily,  half  apologetically;  and  when 
a  man  can  speak  of  his  griefs  to  another,  there 
are  two  ties  established,  one  of  a  sympathy  in 
them,  and  the  other  of  that  lightening  of  the 
soul  from  the  putting  them  into  words,  which 
seems  to  incur  an  obligation  where  really  one  is 
conferred.  It  was  in  this  confidence  that  he  read 
me  the  "  Ode  to  Happiness,"  the  first  full  ex 
pression  of  his  sorrow  he  had  made  to  me ;  and 
I  quite  broke  down,  and  stole  to  the  window  to 
hide  my  tears.  Perhaps  certain  trivial  troubles 
of  my  own,  but  which,  at  the  time,  seemed  to  me 
as  grave  as  death,  put  me  in  tune  with  his  mood, 
and  so  our  friendship  found  its  first  minor  chord. 

Nothing  would  have  induced  me  to  take  his 
advice  and  give  any  other  the  place  I  intended 
for  him  at  "the  launch,"  so  the  first  number  of 
The  Crayon  contained  the  bit  of  his  "  Appledore " 
study,  of  which  he  sent  me  two  more  fragments 
later  on.  He  took  the  liveliest  interest  in  the 
paper  as  long  as  I  remained  at  the  head  of  it, 
and,  amongst  other  things,  wrote  for  it  the 


136         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

"  Invita  Minerva,"  in  the  proof  -  correcting  of 
which  he  allowed  himself  one  of  the  quaint,  and 
to  my  mind  delightful,  bits  of  eccentric  diction 
he  was  so  fond  of,  but  rarely  indulged  in.  The 
second  line,  which  in  the  collected  poems  stands, 
"The  pennon'd  reeds,  that,  as  the  west  wind  blew," 

was  so  written  originally;  but,  in  the  correction 
of  proof,  was  changed  to  "in  the  west  wind  blue," 
and  was  so  printed  in  The  Crayon. 

The  next  letter  I  have  from  him — for  the 
minor  letters  and  the  manuscripts  seem  all  to 
have  gone  to  the  autograph-hunters — is  dated  the 
week  after  The  Crayon  had  been  launched.  I  have 
no  recollection  of  what  I  had  written,  but  I  do 
remember  that  on  reading  the  "Auf  Wiedersehen," 
printed  in  one  of  the  magazines  of  the  day — 
I  think  Putnam's, — I  sent  him  some  verses  which 
that  poem  called  out,  and  in  which,  possibly,  I 
had  tried,  not  to  console,  for  the  folly  of  that  I 
even  then  knew,  but  to  mingle  a  sympathetic 
pain  with  his. 

ELMWOOD,  llth  Jan.  1855. 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND, — I  fear  you  have  thought  me 
very  cold  and  ungrateful  not  to  have  answered 
sooner  (if  it  were  only  with  God  bless  you)  your 
very  kind  and  tender  letter.  I  cannot  say  more 
of  it  than  that  it  came  to  my  heart  like  the 
words  of  a  woman.  I  need  not  write  how  en 
tirely  grateful  I  am  for  it. 

I  have  delayed  writing  till  I  found  a  chance  to 
copy  some  more  "Appledore"  for  you.  I  have  sent 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          137 

a  tolerably  long  bit  this  time,  for  I  suppose  you 
will  like  something  to  fill  up  as  much  as  may  be. 
So,  look  upon  it  as  a  large  canvas  that  will  at 
least  cover  bare  wall.  I  have  had  your  two 
drawings  framed,  and  they  hang  up  now  on  the 
inside  of  my  door,  and  please  everybody  that 
sees  them,  me  above  all. 

I  have  been  fearfully  busy  with  my  lectures ! 
And  so  nervous  about  them,  too !  I  had  never 
spoken  in  public.  There  was  a  great  rush  for 
tickets  (the  lectures  were  gratis),  only  one  in  five 
of  the  applicants  being  supplied,  and  altogether 
I  was  quite  taken  aback.  I  had  no  idea  that 
there  would  be  such  a  desire  to  hear  me. 

I  delivered  my  first  lecture  to  a  crowded  hall 
on  Tuesday  night,  and  I  believe  I  have  succeeded. 
The  lecture  was  somewhat  abstract,  but  I  kept 
the  audience  perfectly  still  for  an  hour  and  a 
quarter.  (They  are  in  the  habit  of  going  out  at 
the  end  of  the  hour.)  I  delivered  it  again  yester 
day  to  another  crowd,  and  was  equally  success 
ful  ;  so  I  think  I  am  safe  now.  But  I  have  six 
yet  to  write,  and  am  consequently  very  busy  and 
pressed  for  time. 

I  felt  anxious,  of  course,  for  I  had  a  double 
responsibility.  The  lectures  [before  the  Lowell 
Institute]  were  founded  by  a  cousin  of  mine,  and 
the  trustee  is  another  cousin ;  so  I  wished  not 
only  to  do  credit  to  myself  and  my  name,  but 
to  justify  my  relative  in  appointing  me  to 
lecture. 

It  is  all  over  now,  and  as  far  as  the  public  is 


138         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

concerned    I    have    succeeded ;    but    the    lectures 
keep  me  awake  and  make  me  lean. 

I  am  quite  sensible  now  that  I  did  not  do  Mr. 
Bryant  justice  in  the  Fable.  But  there  was  no 
personal  feeling  in  what  I  said,  though  I  have 
regretted  what  I  did  say  because  it  might  seem 
personal.  I  am  now  asked  to  write  a  review  of 
his  poems  for  the  North  American.  If  I  do,  I 
shall  try  to  do  him  justice. 

I  think  he  has  been  more  fortunate  in  Flemish 
pictures  than  I,  if  he  does  not  find  in  "Apple- 
dore"  a  sentiment  that  is  wanting  in  them.  One 
of  the  best  fragments  is  yet  to  come.  .  .  . 

Yours,  J.  R.  LOWELL. 

His  allusion  to  Bryant  was  due  to  my  having 
told  him  that  the  latter  was  always  a  little  sore 
at  Lowell's  treatment  of  him  in  the  Fable  for 
Critics,  and  especially  at  the  lines  which  became 
a  commonplace  of  criticism : — 

"  If  he  stir  you  at  all,  it  is  just,  on  my  soul, 
Like  being  stirred  up  with  the  very  North  Pole  ; " 

and  as,  just  before  taking  charge  of  The  Crayon, 
I  had  been  on  the  staff  of  Bryant's  Evening  Post 
and  on  friendly  terms  with  the  poet,  I  had 
become  aware  of  the  impression,  and  desired  to 
efface  it.  The  opportunity  occurred  a  little  later, 
on  the  occasion  of  Lowell's  departure  for  Europe, 
when  I  gave  him  a  dinner  in  New  York,  to 
which  I  invited  Bryant ;  and  seating  them  to 
gether,  with  no  regard  to  precedence  (they  had 
never  seen  each  other  before),  I  left  them  to 


139 

themselves.  Though  there  were  of  the  company 
Charles  Sumner,  C.  F.  Briggs  (Harry  Franco), 
Whipple,  Bayard  Taylor,  and  other  of  Lowell's 
old  friends,  he  devoted  himself  to  Bryant  the 
entire  evening,  and  completely  fascinated  him. 
Anxious  to  gather  the  elder  poet's  impression, 
I  left  Lowell  and  Taylor  at  Oscanyan's  Cafe 
smoking  their  nargilehs,  and  walked  home  with 
Bryant,  soon  satisfying  myself.  The  criticism  of 
Bryant  on  the  "Appledore,"  in  which  he  spoke 
of  it  as  like  a  Flemish  picture  in  its  fidelity, 
was  not  intended  to  be  one  of  disparagement, 
though  Lowell  so  regarded  it. 

Those  who  have  no  acquaintance  with  the 
literary  life  of  the  day  I  am  dealing  with,  can 
hardly  understand  how  limited  then  was  the 
range  of  Lowell's  possession  of  the  public.  It 
was  usual,  amongst  his  friends,  to  speak  of  him 
as  the  "most  Shakespearean  man  since  Shake 
speare";  but,  by  the  American  public  even,  he 
was  hardly  held  as  more  than  a  brilliant  dilet 
tante.  His  carelessness  of  the  form  of  his  earlier 
work,  his  evident  slight  estimation  of  it,  and  the 
extraordinary  ease  with  which  it  was  thrown  off, 
all  contributed  to  this  impression.  The  Biglow 
Papers  were  political  squibs,  of  the  true  position 
of  which,  as  literature,  no  one  then  had  a  just 
conception,  blown  about  as  the  papers  were  in 
the  winds  which  grew  to  the  great  tempest  of 
our  civil  war,  and  they  were  read  with  partisan 
eyes.  The  Fable  for  Critics  was  limited  in  its 
range  of  audience,  and,  treated  as  a  controversial 


140         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

and  personal  jeu  cTesprit,  attacked  and  defended 
without  serious  study;  while  the  serious  poems 
were  so  unequal,  and,  as  he  afterwards  recognised, 
in  some  cases  so  unworthy  his  powers,  that  they 
diminished  the  impression  of  the  mass  of  his  work. 
He  set  so  little  value  on  what  cost  him  no  labour 
— for  he  wrote  verse  more  easily  than  prose — 
that  he  never  gave  himself  the  trouble  of  polish 
ing  or  pruning,  and  the  early  volume  contains 
much  that  is  juvenile  and  open  to  sharp  criticism, 
rendered  all  the  more  certain  by  his  own  pungency 
as  critic.  He  knew  his  own  value,  as  we  know 
it  now,  but  it  was  the  value  in  posse  which  he 
felt;  for  his  work  of  the  moment  he  had  little 
concern.  Had  he  held  more  conceit  of  his  verse 
and  more  anxiety  about  public  opinion,  he  cer 
tainly  would  have  suppressed  much  of  his  early 
work,  to  his  better  reputation  in  later  years.  The 
lectures  referred  to  in  the  letter  last  quoted 
showed  him  in  another  light,  and  justified  the 
faith  of  his  friends  in  his  large  intellectual  posses 
sions.  They  drove  him  into  deep  water,  and  he 
was  obliged  to  swim  in  mare  magno;  their  pre 
paration  involved  work  which,  in  his  melancholy 
and  loneliness,  was  necessary  to  bring  him  out  of 
the  morbid  condition  into  which  he  had  fallen 
when  I  first  knew  him.  He  had  become  hypo- 
chondriacal,  and,  at  the  time  of  my  first  visit,  had 
begun  to  nurse  imaginary  ills,  and  brooded  much 
by  himself,  with  a  hopeless  feeling  as  to  his 
future  condition,  which  he  made  no  effort  to 
throw  off.  The  lectures  forcibly  brought  him  up 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         141 

out  of  the  depths,  and  he  resumed  his  normal  life. 
With  all  his  strength  of  feeling  and  impulsive 
activity,  his  was  too  healthy  a  nature  to  remain 
long  in  morbid  conditions,  and  once  he  had  set 
about  resisting  them  he  rapidly  returned  to 
healthy  work.  On  the  25th  of  January,  a  fort 
night  later  than  the  last  letter,  he  wrote  me: 

".  .  .  I  came  very  near  forgetting  my  proof 
sheets  altogether,  but  I  have  delivered  five  of  my 
lectures  now,  and  on  Friday  shall  have  half 
finished  my  course.  Meanwhile,  I  have  only  a 
week's  start,  so  that  I  have  to  work  hard;  what 
with  inevitable  interruptions.  .  .  . 

"Do  not  think  that  I  feel  the  less  interest  in 
you  and  yours  because  I  write  such  scrawls.  I 
am  not  used  to  being  tied  to  hours  or  driven. 
I  have  always  waited  on  the  good  genius,  and  he 
will  not  come  for  being  sent  after  by  express;  so 
I  am  in  a  feeze  half  the  time." 

And  a  few  days  later,  but  without  date  except 
"Elm wood,"  he  says: — 

"I  shall  have  done  grinding  for  the  Philistines 
next  Saturday,  and  it  will  give  me,  I  need  not 
say,  the  greatest  pleasure  to  see  you.  ...  I  have 
been  meaning  for  some  time  to  write  you  a  word, 
merely  to  say  that  Longfellow  told  me  the  other 
day  that  he  would  send  you  the  first  poem  he 
had  that  was  suitable  for  your  purpose.  Perhaps 
he  has  written;  if  not,  I  shall  be  glad  to  be  the 
herald. 

"You  will  like  to  hear  (but  it  is  at  present  a 
semi -secret)  that  I  am  to  be  nominated  next 


142         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

Thursday  to  fill  Longfellow's  place  in  the  college. 
It  was  all  very  pleasant,  for  the  place  sought  me, 
and  not  I  it. 

"I  have  only  to  deliver  two  courses  of  lectures 
in  the  year;  have  all  the  rest  of  the  time  to  my 
self,  and  the  salary  will  make  me  independent. 
If  the  overseers  of  the  college  confirm  the  ap 
pointment  of  the  Corporation  (of  which  there 
is  little  doubt),  I  shall  go  abroad  for  a  year  to 
Germany  and  Spain  to  acquire  the  languages. 

"So,  by  the  time  you  come,  I  shall  probably  be 
Professor  Lowell,  at  your  service,  and  shall  expect 
immense  respect  in  consequence.  Take  care  after 
that  how  you  squire  or  mister  me.  I  have  not 
discovered  the  dulness  of  The  Crayon,  and  only 
hope  its  point  will  be  sharp  enough  to  draw  the 
public.  If  I  go  to  Berlin,  I  will  send  you  some 
sketches  of  the  gallery  there.  Spain,  too,  is  rich." 

He  was  so  scornful  of  money,  when  his  friends 
were  concerned,  that  he  seemed  to  be  independent 
of  his  labour;  but  we  see  the  satisfaction  with 
which  he  welcomes  the  independence  of  the 
salaried  professor,  and  I  am  sure  that  the  greater 
feeling  in  his  own  mind  was  that  he  could  afford 
to  be  more  generous.  I  never  heard  him  speak 
of  money  except  to  refuse  to  be  paid  it,  and  in 
the  above  communication.  At  that  moment  of 
my  life,  I  was  perhaps  better  prepared  to  be 
liberal  with  him  than  he  with  me,  but  any  com 
pensation  beyond  a  drawing  or  study  from  nature 
was  always  absolutely  refused  to  the  last  of  our 
journalistic  relations ;  and  when,  later  in  life, 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         143 

fortune  left  me  on  the  shoals,  he  insisted  on 
putting  me,  on  occasion,  on  my  feet  again,  with 
all  the  love  of  a  brother  and  the  delicacy  of  a 
poet,  and  always  with  some  excuse  of  an  unex 
pected  good  fortune  which  he  wished  to  partake 
with  some  one. 

"Greater  than  anything  he  ever  did,"  they  used 
to  say;  but  how  much  greater,  and  how  much 
nobler  than  any  work  can  be,  no  one  knows  so 
well  as  I.  His  heart  ran  even  with  his  brain,  and, 
when  there  was  a  chance,  outran  it.  He  had  twin 
faults:  he  under-estimated  his  own  work,  and 
tinted  that  of  his  friends  with  the  colours  of  his 
esteem.  In  one  of  the  exhibitions  of  our  National 
Academy,  I  had  a  large  study  of  a  bit  of  Adiron 
dack  forest  and  lake,  of  which  one  of  the  critics 
had  spoken  in  strongly  damnatory  terms,  and 
Lowell  wrote  me  of  it: — 

ELMWOOD,  2lst  May  1855. 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND,— "It  being  granted  that  the 
earth  is  a  hollow  cube  " — "  But  I  beg  your  pardon, 
my  dear  sir,  I  granted  no  such  thing."  "Well, 
then,  it  being  necessary  to  the  purposes  of  this 
argument  that  the  earth  should  be  a  hollow  cube, 
which  is  precisely  the  same  thing,  I  go  on  to 
demonstrate,"  etc. 

Now,  what  does  he  mean  by  saying  that  your 
picture  is  "an  unpleasingly  grouped  assemblage 
of  unpleasing  natural  objects?"  Is  a  hemlock 
trunk  unpleasing?  Is  the  silvery-grey  bole  of  a 
sloping  birch  unpleasing?  Is  the  beech  stem, 
plashed  with  wavering  pools  of  watery  sunshine, 


144         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

unpleasing?  And  pray  tell  me  how,  in  a  picture, 
a  thing  can  be  "  literally  rendered."  There  is  no 
such  matter  possible.  The  closer  the  imitation, 
in  giving  rounded  or  irregular  shapes,  perspective, 
etc.,  on  a  flat  surface,  the  greater  have  been  the 
difficulties  overcome,  and  the  greater  the  imagina 
tion  in  being  able  to  see  things  as  they  truly  are, 
and  not  as  they  seem.  To  make  a  model  of  a 
beech  stem  is  quite  another  affair.  We  would 
rather  have  a  section  of  the  real  thing.  Is  there 
not  a  difference  even  in  daguerreotypes  in  favour 
of  the  man  who  is  enough  of  an  artist  to  choose 
the  right  moment  and  point  of  view?  And  even 
were  the  tree  trunk  a  deformed  one,  were  it  ever 
so  ugly,  mis-shapen,  warty,  scrofulous,  carious, 
what  you  will,  it  is  one  of  the  curious  psycho 
logical  facts  that  it  is  yet  not  unpleasing.  For, 
while  any  lusus  naturce  in  anything  that  breathes 
is  hateful,  a  fanciful  resemblance  to  the  diseases 
and  deformities  of  animal  life  in  anything  that 
merely  grows  appeals  at  once  to  our  sense  of  the 
odd,  the  humorous,  the  grotesque;  or  else  is  not 
disagreeable,  because  it  is  a  likeness  upward  and 
not  downward.  But  this  glances  toward  a  deeper 
deep,  and  I  forbear.  Anyhow,  I  like  your  picture 
and  the  idea  of  it ;  only,  you  must  make  interest 
with  Aquarius  to  water  your  lake  a  little.  But 

"  When  they  talked  of  their  Raphaels,  Correggios,  and  stuff, 
He  shifted  his  trumpet,  and  only  took  snuff." 

Or,  let  me  translate  a  proverb  from  the  Feejee 
dialect : — 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         145 

"  That  which  we  like,  likes  us : 
No  need  of  any  fuss." 

Nay,  take  this  other,  which  I  this  moment  copy 
from  the  walls  of  a  house  just  unburied  at 
Pompeii : — 

"  Perchance  the  thing  I  banish,  me  expels; 
Be  chary,  ostracizer,  of  your  shells  ! 
Madman,  thou  deem'st  thyself  sublimely  free, 
And  ly'st  on  straw  in  that  crampt  cell  of  Thee." 

Or,  perhaps,  this  is  a  better  translation  of  the  last 
couplet : — 

"  Thou  deem'st  thyself  a  King,  poor  crazy  elf, 
Chained  to  the  wall  of  that  crampt  cell,  Thyself." 

The  Feejee  Islanders  (who  love  curried  Calvinists 
and  minced  missionary)  and  the  Pompeians  (who 
got  up  such  suicidal  fireworks  for  the  entertain 
ment  of  Admiral  Pliny)  knew  a  thing  or  two, 
nevertheless ! 

It  is  a  glorious,  blue,  north-westerly  sky;  the 
oak  woods  are  pink  with  buds;  the  linnets,  cat 
birds,  fire-hangbirds,  and  robins  are  all  singing 
hymeneals  to  the  Spring,  and  she  trembles  through 
all  her  wreaths  of  new-born  leaves  and  seems 
equally  pleased  with  each  of  them.  She  does  not 
say,  "Oh,  Linnet,  put  yourself  to  school  with 
Maestro  Catbird,"  nor  "Be  silent,  Robin,  my  boy, 
till  you  can  sing  like  Signer  Robert  of  Lincoln." 
Per  Bacco !  did  not  brave  Masaccio  paint  St  Peter 
right  in  the  streets  of  Florence,  working  a  miracle 
with  vulgar  Florentines  all  about  him,  and  did 
not  Raphael  and  Michael  say  that  the  Brancacci 

chapel  was  their  school  ?  .  .  . 

K 


146         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

In  a  letter  of  a  little  earlier  date  (10th  of  May 
1855)  he  gives  another  instance  of  his  constant 
thoughtfulness  for  others  :— 

"...  I  saw  Longfellow  yesterday,  and  reminded 
him  of  his  promise  to  send  you  a  poem;  and  he 
renewed  it,  but  said  that  he  had  not  anything  he 
liked  well  enow  to  send.  I  told  him  that  it  did 
not  much  matter  for  a  long  poem,  and  that  his 
name  would  be  of  service  to  The  Crayon  now  that 
it  was  seeking  an  introduction  to  the  world.  I 
know  that  he  means  rightly,  and  only  hope  that 
he  will  send  you  something  while  it  can  be  of 
commercial  advantage  to  you.  Don't  be  shocked 
at  my  market-place  view  of  the  thing;  I  feel  as 
wise  as  a  woman  when  I  find  anybody  with  a 
beard  who  seems  a  worse  manager  than  I,  and 
one  has  a  right  to  be  shrewd  for  his  friend.  Mean 
while,  I  send  you  some  verses  of  my  own,  which 
you  may  like  or  not,  as  you  please.  They  are  very 
much  at  your  service  if  you  want  them,  and  per 
haps  Professor  Lowell's  name  may  be  of  use.  .  .  . 
As  soon  as  we  have  a  leaf  or  two  I  shall  expect 
a  visit  from  you.  I  will  write  and  let  you  know 
when  our  winter  is  over.  Our  spring  is  like 
that  delicacy,  a  frozen  plum  pudding,  which  cheats 
every  uninitiated  person  into  an  impromptu  tooth 
ache.  It  looks  as  if  it  ought  to  be  hot,  and  it  is 
Nova  Zembla  focussed." 

Following  these  letters  there  is  a  wide  gap  in 
my  file.  I  have  no  memorandum  of  the  time 
of  his  sailing  for  Germany,  but  in  the  letter  of 
May  10th  he  says,  "Think  of  anything  I  can  do 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         147 

for  you  on  the  other  side.  I  go  to  Germany  first "  ; 
and  the  next  letter  I  have  is  dated  from  Dresden. 
I  was  overworked  on  The  Crayon,  and  he  on  his 
German  studies ;  for  he  was  not  a  man  to  do  less 
than  his  utmost  when  he  had  accepted  his  duty. 
But  this  is  dated  October  14,  1855,  and  shows 
already  the  renewed  intellectual  activity  at  full 
swing.  The  wit  and  humour,  which  in  our  first 
acquaintance  only  flashed  out  in  intervals  of  gloom, 
begin  to  take  the  upper  hand  again. 

.  .  .  You  may  lay  it  to  anything  you  like,  except 
my  having  forgotten  you,  that  I  have  not  written 
sooner.  I  have  thought  of  you  only  too  much, 
for  I  wished,  when  I  wrote,  to  send  you  something 
for  The  Crayon-,  and  not  finding  aught  to  write 
about,  you  began  to  haunt  me  and  shake  your 
printer's-inky  locks  at  me — only,  unhappily,  the  case 
was  the  reverse  of  Banquo's,  since  thou  couldst 
say  I'd  not  done  it.  Now,  this  would  not  do.  I 
would  not  have  a  friendship  which  I  value  so  much, 
more  than  any  contracted  in  these  later  years, 
associated  with  any  uneasy  thought.  So  I  resolved 
to  lay  the  ghost  at  once,  as  we  can  all  blue  ghosts 
that  haunt  us,  in  a  sea  of  ink.  What  have  I  to 
say  that  I  had  not  a  month  ago  ?  Nothing ;  but 
then  I  will  write  and  manfully  say  so.  I  can,  at 
least,  tell  you  how  warm  a  feeling  I  have  towards 
you,  and  that  is  something.  But  for  The  Crayon  ? 
That  we  will  see  presently.  First,  I  must  thank 
you  for  the  likeness  of  yourself,  which  you  may 
be  sure  I  am  glad  to  have  with  me,  and  for  your 


148         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

letters.  Only,  why  so  short?  One  would  think 
you  were  writing  across  Broadway  instead  of  the 
Atlantic.  But  I  will  give  it  a  good  turn  by  think 
ing  that  you  do  not  feel  me  far  away  from  you, 
as  truly  I  am  not.  About  Griswold  and  the  rest 
of  it  I  understand  nothing,  and  care  as  little,  unless 
for  its  troubling  you.  When  I  get  over  here,  it  is 
the  Styx  that  is  between  me  and  America.  I  have 
drunk  Lethe  water  to  wash  down  Nepenthe  with, 
and  have  forgotten  everything  but  my  friends, 
like  a  happy  shade.  What  care  we  careless  spirits 
for  what  troubled  us  in  the  flesh  ?  "  My  little 
man,"  says  Wordsworth  to  Pope,  when  they  meet 
in  the  Fortunate  Islands,  "  I  am  sorry  to  say " — 
the  wretch !  he  is  not  sorry  a  bit —  "  that  your 
poems  are  not  so  much  read  as  once."  "  My  what  ? 
Ah !  poems — yes,  I  think  I  did  write  some  things 
once.  And  so  they  don't  read  'em,  eh  ?  Tis  all 
one  for  that — I  wouldn't  read  'em  myself.  Come 
in,  Mr — a — a — I  beg  your  pardon — ah,  Woodwarth  ? 
Yes,  come  in,  Mr  Woodwarth,  and  try  the  Lethe : 
'tis  the  best  spring  in  the  place;  and  you  will 
meet  some  eminent  characters  in  the  pump-room." 
So  it  goes.  Give  yourself  no  more  trouble  about 
the  picture.  As  it  is  one,  I  suppose  I  may  say 
hang  the  picture !  But  I  dare  be  sworn  you  have 
forgotten  all  about  it  by  this  time. 

But  for  The  Crayon — what  have  I  seen?  Why, 
I  have  seen  the  Van  Eyck  at  Ghent,  and  liked  it 
so  well  that  I  have  never  a  word  to  say  about  it. 
And  I  saw  the  Memlings  at  Bruges— what  a  place 
it  is!  a  bit  of  Italy  drifted  away  northward  and 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         149 

stranded  like  an  erratic  boulder  in  Flanders — and 
I  liked  those  so  well  that  I  am  equally  dumb  there- 
anent.  And  I  saw  the  Rubenses  in  Antwerp, 
which  have  all  been  skinned  alive  by  the  restorers, 
and  which  they  have  put  into  a  little  room  fenced 
off  from  the  cathedral,  so  that  they  may  get  a 
franc  out  of  every  stranger  who  comes  there — 
the  Jews !  "  Is  not  my  Father's  house  a  house  of 
prayer?  But  ye  have  made  it  a  den  of  thieves." 
There  has  been  great  power  and  passion  in  those 
pictures — Rubens  is  a  poem  translated  out  of  Low 
Dutch  into  Italian ;  but  in  the  little  doghole  where 
they  are,  one  cannot  see  them.  What  was  meant 
to  be  seen  at  forty  feet  shall  one  see  at  fifteen  ? 
Offer  a  man  a  magnifying-glass  to  look  at  an 
elephant  with !  Somehow  I  feel  inclined  to  say 
"He  was  a  great  gentleman,  that  Rubens,"  but 
great  man  seems  a  little  too  much.  But  great  he 
surely  was  in  some  sense  or  other — you  feel  that. 
Then  I  saw  all  the  Dutch  pictures  at  the  Hague ; 
but  I  think  that  Rembrandt,  the  greatest  imagina 
tion  these  low  countries  ever  produced,  is  better 
seen  here  in  Dresden,  than  at  the  Hague.  As  for 
Paul  Potter's  famous  Bull,  it  is  no  more  to  be 
compared  with  Rosa  Bonheur's  Horse  Fair  than 
a  stuffed  and  varnished  dolphin  with  a  living  one. 
Here  there  are  some  wonderful  pictures.  Titian's 
Tribute-Money  is  marvellously  great ;  the  head 
of  Christ  the  noblest  and  most  pathetic  I  have 
ever  seen,  full  of  a  magnificent  sadness.  There  is 
also  a  truly  delicious  Claude,  and  deep  rock-em 
bedded  bay  so  liquidly  dark  and  cool !  There  is  a 


150         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

Holy  Family  by  Holbein,  too,  pathetically  prosaic. 
I  forgot  to  speak  of  an  Albert  Diirer  at  the  Hague, 
a  portrait  of  the  future  emperor  (Maximilian,  I 
think)  as  a  child  of  three  years,  with  an  apple  in 
his  hand  instead  of  the  globe  of  empire  which 
was  afterward,  if  I  remember,  so  heavy  for  him. 
Is  it  not  a  pretty  fancy?  But  I  have  really  got 
something  for  The  Crayon — this  is  not,  but  must 
wait  till  next  week's  mail — an  account  of  a  visit 
I  made  to  Retsch.  It  is  late  now,  and  I  am  not 
in  a  good  mood,  either.  I  have  heard  bad  news — 
not  of  M.,  thank  God! 

You  might  make  an  item  out  of  this — that  the 
King  of  Saxony  allows  no  copies  to  be  made  in 
the  gallery,  in  order  that  the  artists  here  may 
choose  original  subjects  and  paint  them  out  of 
their  own  experience.  Also  Bendemann  (their 
best  painter  here)  is  making  a  good  picture,  very 
pure  and  classic,  out  of  the  meeting  of  Ulysses 
with  Nausicaa,  in  the  Odyssey.  But  I  must  say 
good-night  and  God  bless  you!  I  have  so  much 
writing  of  German  to  do  that  my  eyes  can't  bear 
much  night  work,  and  it  is  near  twelve.  Sunday 
is  my  only  holiday.  Next  week,  then.  .  .  . 

The  visit  to  Retsch  never  came.  Lowell  always 
planned  more  than  any  mortal  man  could  do;  he 
laid  schemes  of  work  like  bridges  with  one  abut 
ment  in  time  and  the  other  in  eternity.  He  had 
too  much  to  do,  and  I,  on  the  other  side,  became 
so  overborne  by  my  editorial  duties — The  Crayon 
going  to  leeward  all  the  time  then  —  that  our 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         151 

correspondence  flagged.  The  next  word  I  have 
from  him  shows  the  man  overworked  and  de 
jected,  but  doing  his  duty  to  his  position. 

DRESDEN,  18th  Feb'y  1856. ' 

MY  DEAR  FRIEND,— I  reproach  myself  bitterly 
for  not  having  sooner  answered  your  letter,  but 
what  is  the  use  of  spurring  an  already  beaten- 
out  horse  ?  What  energy  can  self-reproach  com 
municate  to  a  man  who  has  barely  resolution 
enough  to  do  what  is  necessary  for  the  day, 
and  who  shoves  everything  else  over  into  the 
never-coming  to-morrow?  To  say  all  in  one 
word,  I  have  been  passing  a  very  wretched 
winter.  I  have  been  out  of  health  and  out  of 
spirits,  gnawed  a  great  part^  of  the  time  by  an 
insatiable  home-sickness,  and  deprived  of  my 
usual  means  of  ridding  myself  of  bad  thoughts 
by  putting  them  into  verse ;  for  I  have  always 
felt  that  I  was  here  for  the  specific  end  of 
learning  German,  and  not  of  pleasing  myself. 

Just  now  I  am  better  in  body  and  mind.  My 
cure  has  been  wrought  by  my  resolving  to  run 
away  for  a  month  into  Italy.  Think  of  it — 
Italy !  I  shall  see  Page  and  Norton  and  the 
grave  of  our  little  Walter.*  I  can  hardly  believe 
that  I  am  going,  and  in  ten  days. 

What  you  tell  me  about  The  Crayon,  you 
may  be  sure  fills  me  with  a  very  sincere  regret. 
It  does  not  need  to  tell  you  how  much  interest 

*  Lowell's  little  boy,  who  died  at  Rome,  and  is  buried  in  the 
Protestant  cemetery  there. 


152         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

I  took  in  it  and  you;  and,  what  is  better,  my 
interest  in  it  was  not  that  merely  of  a  friend  of 
yours,  but  sprang  from  a  conviction  that  it  would 
do  much  for  the  aesthetic  culture  of  our  people. 
I  am  very  sorry  on  every  account  that  it  is  to  be 
given  up.  I  had  hoped  so  much  from  it.  It  is  a 
consolation  to  me  that  you  will  be  restored  to 
the  practice  instead  of  the  criticism  and  exposi 
tion  of  art,  and  that  we  shall  get  some  more 
pictures  like  the  one  which  took  so  strong  a 
hold  of  me  in  the  New  York  exhibition.  I  shall 
hope  to  become  the  possessor  of  one  myself,  after 
I  get  quietly  settled  again  at  Elmwood  with 
the  Old  Man  of  the  Sea  of  my  first  course  of 
lectures  off  my  shoulders.  You  must  come  and 
make  me  a  visit,  and  I  will  show  you  some  nice 
studies  of  landscape  in  our  neighbourhood,  and 
especially  one  bit  of  primitive  forest  that  I  know 
within  a  mile  and  a  half  of  our  house. 

I  have  been  studying  like  a  dog — no,  dogs  don't 
study,  I  mean  a  learned  pig — this  winter,  and  I 
think  my  horizon  has  grown  wider,  and  that  when 
I  come  back  I  shall  be  worth  more  to  my  friends. 
I  have  learned  the  boundaries  of  my  knowledge, 
and  Terra  Incognita  does  not  take  so  much  space 
on  my  maps.  In  German,  I  have  every  reason 
to  be  satisfied  with  my  progress,  though  I  should 
have  learned  more  of  the  colloquial  language  if 
I  had  had  spirits  enough  to  go  into  any  society. 
But  already  the  foreboding  of  Italy  fills  me  with 
a  new  life  and  soul.  I  feel  as  if  I  had  been  living 
with  no  outlook  on  my  south  side,  and  as  if  a 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         153 

wall  had  been  toppled  over  which  had  darkened 
all  my  windows  in  that  direction.  Bodily 
and  spiritually  I  have  suffered  here  with  cold, 
but,  God  be  thanked,  it  will  soon  be  over. 

My  great  solace  (or  distraction)  has  been  the 
theatre,  which  is  here  excellent.  I  not  only  get  a 
lesson  in  German,  but  I  have  learned  much  of  the 
technology  of  the  stage.  For  historical  accuracy 
in  costume  and  scenery,  I  have  never  seen  any 
thing  comparable.  An  artistic  nicety  and  scrupu 
lousness  extends  itself  to  the  most  inconsidered 
trifles  in  which  so  much  of  illusion  consists,  and 
which  commonly  are  so  bungled  as  to  draw 
attention  instead  of  evading  it  by  an  absorption 
in  the  universal. 

If  I  had  known  that  I  was  going  to  London, 
I  should  have  been  extremely  pleased  to  have 
made  the  acquaintance  of  Ruskin.  But  my  jour 
ney  thither  was  sudden  and  flighty,  and  I  saw 
nobody  except  Hogarth,  Turner,  and  Rembrandt. 
Hogarth's  Marriage  a  la  Mode  and  Rembrandt's 
Jacob's  Dream,  at  Dulwich  College,  gave  me 
invaluable  suggestions. 

It  will  not  be  long  now,  I  hope,  before  I  see 
you  at  Elmwood;  for  you  must  make  me  a 
visit  as  soon  as  I  get  warm  in  my  study  again. 
It  is  all  Berg  ab  now,  and  I  shall  ere  long  feel 
the  swing  of  our  Atlantic  once  more.  The  very 
thought  revives  me.  We  seaboard  fellows  cannot 
live  long  without  snuffing  salt  water.  Let  me 
hear  from  you  in  Italy;  tell  me  what  you  are 
painting  and  all  about  yourself.  As  soon  as  I 


154         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

am  myself  again,  I  shall  try  to  make  my  friend 
ship  of  some  worth  to  you.  But  always  I  am 
your  affectionate  friend, 

J.  R.  L. 

The  next  gap  in  the  correspondence  is  one  of 
over  a  year.  I  do  not  remember,  and  have  no 
record  of  the  time,  when  he  married  his  second 
wife,  Frances  Dunlap;  but  the  revolution  she 
brought  about  in  his  life  had  begun  before  his 
friends  knew  the  causes  of  it.  She  was  one  of 
the  rarest  and  most  sympathetic  creatures  I  have 
ever  known.  She  was  the  governess  of  Lowell's 
daughter,  when  I  first  went  to  stay  at  Elmwood, 
and  I  then  felt  the  charm  of  her  character.  She 
was  a  sincere  Swedenborgian,  with  the  serene 
faith  and  spiritual  outlook  I  have  generally  found 
to  be  characteristic  of  that  sect ;  with  a  warmth 
of  spiritual  sympathy  of  which  I  have  known 
few  so  remarkable  instances;  a  fine  and  subtle 
faculty  of  appreciation,  serious  and  tender,  which 
was  to  Lowell  like  an  enfolding  of  the  Divine  Spirit. 
The  only  particular  in  which  the  sympathy  failed 
was  in  the  feeling  that  she  had  in  regard  to  his 
humorous  poems.  She  disliked  the  vein.  It  was 
not  that  she  lacked  humour  or  the  appreciation 
of  his,  but  she  thought  that  kind  of  literature 
unworthy  of  him.  This  she  said  to  me  more  than 
once.  But,  aside  from  this,  she  fitted  him  like  the 
air  around  him.  He  had  felt  the  charm  of  her 
character  before  he  went  to  Europe,  and  had  begun 
to  bend  to  it ;  but,  as  he  said  to  me  after  his  mar- 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          155 

riage,  he  would  make  no  sign  till  he  had  tested 
by  a  prolonged  absence  the  solidity  of  the  feeling 
he  had  felt  growing  up.  He  waited,  therefore, 
till  his  visit  to  Germany  had  satisfied  him  that  it 
was  sympathy,  and  not  propinquity,  that  lay  at 
the  root  of  his  inclination  for  her,  before  declaring 
himself.  No  married  life  could  be  more  fortunate 
in  all  respects  except  one — they  had  no  children. 
But  for  all  that  his  life  required  she  was  to  him 
healing  from  sorrow  and  a  defence  against  all 
trouble,  a  very  spring  of  life  and  hope.  A  letter 
from  Cambridge  (May  14,  1857)  must  have  been 
written  in  the  interval  between  his  return  from 
Germany  and  this  change  in  his  life,  for  he  had 
begun  his  work  at  the  university. 

...  I  am  glad  you  do  not  forget  me,  though  I 
seem  so  memoryless  and  ungrateful.  I  shall  be 
better  one  of  these  days,  I  hope.  While  my 
lectures  are  on  my  mind  I  am  not  myself,  and 
I  seem  to  see  all  the  poetry  drying  out  of  me. 
I  droop  on  my  rocks  and  hear  the  surge  of  the 
living  waters,  but  they  will  not  reach  me  till 
some  extraordinary  springtide,  and  maybe  not 
then.  .  .  . 

When  you  come,  I  wish  you  to  come  straight 
here.  We  can  house  you  for  a  while  [he  was 
then  living  with  his  friend,  Dr  Estes  Howe,  in 
Cambridge,  Elmwood  having  been  let  for  a 
term]  at  any  rate,  and  the  word  "board"  is 
hateful  to  me.  Just  now  there  is  a  sister  of 
Mrs here,  with  the  biggest  baby  that  ever 


156         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

was  seen.  If  the  nurse  were  in  proportion,  the 
house  would  have  to  be  greatened.  And  there 
is  also  the  biggest  (and  nicest)  young  lady  from 
Ohio.  So  where  could  I  put  you  at  night,  unless 
I  hung  you  up  or  leaned  you  up  in  a  corner,  like 
a  beau  as  you  are?  But  the  drift  of  things  will 
go  on,  and  they  will  float  away  on  it  before 
long,  and  then  there  will  be  a  bed,  and  that 
will  be  better.  I  will  let  you  know  when.  I 
shall  be  jolly  and  companionable  by  that  time, 
which  I  was  not  when  you  were  here  before, 
for  I  could  think  of  nothing  but  the  lectures 
which  were  before  me.  Perhaps  you  were  right 
about  it  and  I  have  no  business  here.  How 
ever,  we  die  at  last  and  go  where  there  are  no 
lectures. 

The  apple-trees  are  in  blossom,  but  I  have 
hardly  had  time  to  see  them.  Horse-chestnuts  are 
in  leaf,  and  linnets  and  robins  sing;  but  there 
are  not  so  many  birds  here  as  at  Elmwood — 
not  so  many  anywhere  as  there  used  to  be,  and 
I  think  the  cares  of  life  weigh  on  them  so  that 
they  can't  sing.  We  have  had  only  a  day  or 
two  of  warm  weather  yet.  Spring  seems  like 
an  ill-arranged  scene  at  the  theatre  that  hitches 
and  won't  slide  forward,  and  we  see  winter 
through  the  gaps.  Bring  May  with  you  when 
you  come — remember  that.  Tell  me  what  your 
plans  are,  and  when  you  have  arranged  to  come 
hitherward  and  when  you  would  rather.  .  .  . 

Your  affectionate 

J.  R.  L. 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         157 

In  the  next  letter  there  are  landmarks  of  our 
separate  journeys  in  life.  Lowell  had  married 
Miss  Dunlap ;  we  had  made  our  first  excursion 
to  the  Adirondacks;  the  Atlantic  Monthly  had 
been  founded,  with  Lowell  as  its  editor.  I  had 
become  his  contributor,  as  he  had  been  mine. 
In  one  of  my  letters  after  his  marriage,  I  had 
written  to  congratulate  him,  saying  that  I  had 
already  written  one  letter  (probably  on  hearing 
of  the  engagement)  and  had  suppressed  it,  as  too 
enthusiastic  and  perhaps  boyish. 

CAMBRIDGE,  28th  October  1857. 

MY  DEAR  STILLMAN,  —  Thank  you  for  your 
letters,  especially  that  from  the  dear  old  Adiron 
dacks.  Though  written  in  pencil,  it  did  my 
heart  more  good  than  my  eyes  harm,  only  it 
made  me  homesick  to  be  back  again 

"A  chasing  the  wild-deer  and  following  the  roe." 

Your  last  I  ought  to  have  answered  a  week 
ago;  but  when  I  stop  payment  of  letters  I  do  it 
altogether,  and,  like  a  man  of  honour,  allow  no 
favoured  creditors. 

I  should  like  the  article  very  much.  Make  it 
about  >ix  or  seven  pages  (print),  and  at  the  same 
time  be  as  lively  and  as  solid  as  you  can.  You 
may  have  full  swing.  This  is  like  ordering  so 
many  pints  of  inspiration,  eh  ? —  as  if  Castaly 
were  bottled  up  like  Congress  water  and  sent 
all  over  the  country  for  sale.  Well,  never  mind, 
make  it  as  good  as  you  can.  Instructive  articles 
should  be  sweetened  as  much  as  possible,  for  people 


158         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

don't  naturally  like  to  learn  anything,  and  prefer 
taking  their  information  as  much  as  they  can 
in  disguise. 

Why  did  you  not  send  me  the  enthusiastic 
letter  you  say  you  suppressed?  I  should  have 
been  delighted  with  it.  For  God's  sake,  don't 
let  your  enthusiasm  go!  it  is  your  good  genius. 
When  we  have  once  lost  it,  we  would  give  all 
the  barren  rest  of  our  lives  to  get  back  but  a 
day  of  it.  Your  letter  would  have  hit  in  the 
white,  too,  for  I  am  as  happy  as  I  can  be,  and 
thank  God  continually.  I  have  known  and 
honoured  my  wife  for  years,  but  I  find  some 
new  good  in  her  daily.  So  you  may  be  as  warm 
as  you  like  in  your  congratulations.  .  .  . 

Affectionately  yours, 

J.  K.  LOWELL. 

I  think  it  was  in  the  summer  of  the  next  year 
that  I  went  to  Cambridge  to  live,  and  was 
thenceforward  mainly  divided  in  my  occupations 
between  the  Adirondacks  and  the  vicinity  of 
"the  Oaks"  at  Waverley  until  I  went  to  Europe, 
in  the  autumn  of  1859.  Each  summer  we  made 
an  excursion  into  the  Adirondacks,  and  formed 
the  club  which  took  its  name  from  that  region. 
Under  the  circumstances,  few  letters  passed  be 
tween  us,  for  we  were  not  long  without  seeing 
each  other  until  I  went  abroad.  Lowell  was 
indeed  very  happy  in  his  married  life,  and 
amongst  the  pictures  Memory  will  keep  on  her 
tablet  for  me,  till  Death  passes  his  sponge  over 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          159 

it  once  for  all,  is  one  of  his  wife  lying  in  a  long 
chair  under  the  trees  at  Dr  Howe's,  when  the 
sun  was  getting  cool,  and  laughing  with  her  low, 
musical  laugh  at  a  contest  in  punning  between 
Lowell  and  myself,  hand  passibus  cequis,  but  in 
which  he  found  enough  to  provoke  his  wit  to 
activity;  her  almost  Oriental  eyes  twinkling  with 
fun,  half  closed  and  flashing  from  one  to  the 
other  of  us;  her  low,  sweet  forehead,  wide 
between  the  temples;  mouth  wreathing  with 
humour;  and  the  whole  frame,  lithe  and  fragile, 
laughing  with  her  eyes  at  his  extravagant  and 
rollicking  word-play.  One  would  hardly  have 
said  that  she  was  a  beautiful  woman,  but  fasci 
nating  she  was  in  the  happiest  sense  of  the 
word,  with  all  the  fascination  of  pure  and 
perfect  womanhood  and  perfect  happiness. 

In  those  days  the  boy  was  still  riotous  in 
Lowell ;  and,  until  the  war  came,  with  its  heart 
breaking  for  him  and  his,  and  he  entered  into 
the  larger  sphere  of  public  affairs,  the  escapades 
of  his  overflowing  and  juvenile  vitality  were 
irrepressible.  In  the  Adirondacks  he  cast  off 
all  dignity,  was  one  of  the  best  and  most 
devoted  shots  with  the  rifle,  but  proposed  to 
introduce,  by  regulation,  archery  for  our  deer- 
hunting.  He  was  the  life  of  the  company,  al 
ways  running  over  with  fun  and  contrivance  of 
merriment.  I  remember  once,  coming  home  from 
Boston  with  those  members  of  the  Saturday  Club 
who  lived  in  Cambridge — Agassiz,  Howe,  Holmes, 
Lowell,  and  others,  that  in  the  midst  of  a  grave 


160         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

discussion  between  Agassiz  and  himself  upon 
the  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  Lowell,  pass 
ing  through  the  exit  from  the  college  grounds, 
vaulted  suddenly  on  one  of  the  great  stone 
columns,  clapped  his  hands  to  his  sides,  gave  a 
lusty  cockcrow,  and  hopped  down  again  to  pursue 
the  argument,  insisting  on  the  admission  of  the 
Psalms  amongst  the  inspired  books.  Nothing 
human  was  foreign  to  his  sympathies.  He 
knew  that  I  really  loved  him  and  was  grateful 
for  it;  and,  though  I  continually  offended  his 
sense  of  fitness  and  decorum,  doing  things 
wanting  in  tact  and  refinement,  in  sheer  and 
green,  if  belated,  boyishness  and  want  of  judg 
ment,  he  never  took  offence,  but  treated  me 
as  a  younger  brother;  for  he  understood  my 
feeling  for  him,  uncouth  as  were  its  forms  at 
times;  and  his  benevolence  towards  me  never 
faltered,  though  the  diverging  circumstances  of 
our  lives  carried  us  farther  and  farther  apart. 
His  bitter  griefs  and  bereavements  during  and 
following  our  war,  his  troubles,  personal  and 
patriotic,  his  absorption  later  in  official  duties, 
the  accumulating  burdens  which  would  have 
crushed  the  energies  of  a  smaller  man,  left  his 
serenity  undisturbed;  even  the  disgusting  attacks 
of  the  Irishry  and  the  politicians,  on  account  of 
his  action  in  England,  only  raised  a  philosophic 
sarcasm.  He  was  so  much  "greater  than  any 
thing  he  ever  did"  that  I  would  rather  every 
line  he  ever  wrote  were  blotted  from  my  memory 
than  that  I  should  forget  the  days  I  spent  at 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         161 

Elmwood,  or  those  we  spent  in  the  greenwood 
of  the  Adirondacks;  but  one  and  the  other 
locality,  like  all  those  in  which  I  knew  him, 
are  forever  lonely  and  desolate  to  me. 

The  latest  word  I  have  from  him  was  written 
from  the  Legation  in  London,  in  answer  to  one 
inquiring  if  he  had  received  a  bit  of  Albanian 
work  I  had  sent  him  from  Montenegro,  a  new 
tip  to  the  sheath  of  a  yataghan  of  some  rare 
and  early  Albanian  silver  work,  which  I  had  sent 
him  before,  but  which  then  lacked  its  original 
tip.  It  is  dated  7th  of  March  1882. 

.  .  .  Yes,  my  dear  Stillman,  the  tip  of  the  sheath 
arrived  safely,  and  is  thought  very  pretty,  although 
it  does  not  come  up  to  the  old  work,  and  could 
not  fairly  be  called  on  for  such  a  feat  in  practical 
aesthetics.  We  like  it. 

You  have  learned  to  be  satirical  in  the  neigh 
bourhood  of  the  Aristophanic  Theatre,  but  I  shake 
off  your  sarcasms,  not  as  the  lion,  but  as  the 
duck  the  dewdrop  from  his  back.  I  may  fairly 
answer  in  the  Gospel  words,  "silver  and  gold 
have  I  none,"  for  I  am  so  near  my  wit's  end  that 
I  have  neither  speech  nor  silence,  or  feel  so,  at 
least.  [I  had  written  to  ask  him  to  exchange  some 
of  his  golden  silence  for  a  little  silver  speech.] 

But  I  had  enough  sentiment  left  to  be  a  good 
deal  upset  by  the  story  of  your  murder  [a  telegram 
from  Cettinje  had  announced  that  I  had  been 
decapitated  in  Albania],  though  I  did  not  believe 
it.  I  hate  the  electric  telegraph  worse  than  ever, 


162         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

If  you  come  across  an  ancient  statue,  send  it 
me  by  post,  and  I  will  pay  you  in  the  metal  with 
so  much  of  which    you  credit  me.      Mrs    Lowell 
sends  her  kindest  regards,  and  I  remain 
Affectionately  always  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

The  handwriting  begins  to  show  age — it  is 
tremulous,  and  the  letters  are  writ  large.  Death 
only,  if  even  death,  could  extinguish  the  kindly 
thought,  the  fine  sense  of  humour,  the  affectionate 
fidelity  to  the  past  and  its  ties;  nothing  had 
changed  in  him  to  the  last.  WTien  last  I  saw 
him,  shortly  before  his  recall  from  London,  he 
certainly  showed  the  signs  of  age,  but  I  think 
less  than  I;  the  kindly  caress  in  his  voice,  the 
flash  of  humour  in  his  eye,  the  masterhood  in 
his  port,  were  there  as  I  had  known  them  thirty 
years  before.  Wrinkles  and  grey  hair  were  there, 
and  the  tremulousness  of  the  hand  in  writing; 
but  the  mind,  though  sobered  by  such  sorrows 
as  few  men  bear,  was  as  serene  and  spiritual 
as  ever.  I  could  imagine  that  he  laboured  under 
his  dispensations  as  a  good  ship  in  a  storm, 
burying  his  head  at  times  under  the  wave,  but 
rising  to  it,  shaking  off  the  weight,  and  keeping 
on. 

Sufficient  time  has  gone  by  since  the  death  of 
Lowell  for  the  world  to  begin  to  form  a  judg 
ment  on  the  poet,  unbiassed  by  his  influence  as  a 
man  oh  those  around  him ;  but  to  those  who,  like 
myself,  lived  in  unrestrained  intimacy  with  him, 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS          163 

this  judgment  is  impossible,  and  I  will  not  profess 
it.  Yet  it  seems  to  me  that  he  stands  as  the  most 
perfect  representative  of  the  American  of  New 
England  which  has  appeared — i.e.,  the  American 
as  he  resulted  from  the  hereditary  qualities  of 
the  Mother-country  developed  under  the  surround 
ings  in  which  New  England  became  a  nation,  and 
before  the  influences  born  in  the  war  of  secession 
had  begun  to  transform  it  to  what  it  now  is.  Be 
it  for  better  or  for  worse,  the  United  States  is 
not  what  it  was  in  the  days  when  Lowell  grew 
up,  when  the  struggle  between  principles  and 
policies  was  still  fierce  and  the  slavery  question 
made  men  conscious  of  a  moral  responsibility  in 
the  nation,  the  sense  of  which  has  now,  it  seems 
to  me,  died  out.  The  change  may  be,  as  Lowell 
hoped,  and  as  we  will  hope,  one  of  growth,  one 
in  which  the  ultimate  character  is  hidden  in  the 
process  of  metamorphosis,  and  the  final  form  may 
be  what  the  passionate  patriotism  of  Lowell  pre 
figured  it  in  his  Commemoration  Ode : 

"O!  Beautiful  my  Country  !  ours  once  more, 
Smoothing  thy  gold  of  war-dishevelled  hair 
O'er  such  sweet  brows  as  never  other  wore, 

And  letting  thy  set  lips, 

Freed  from  wrath's  pale  eclipse, 
The  rosy  edges  of  their  smile  lay  bare. 
What  words  divine  of  lover  or  of  poet 
Could  tell  our  love  and  make  thee  know  it — 
Among  the  nations  bright  beyond  compare  ?  " 

and  if  not,  then  Lowell  remains  as  the  best  fruit 
on  a  tree  prematurely  blasted.  To  me,  perhaps, 
in  the  blindness  of  a  friendship  of  whose  extremity 


164         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

he  was  completely  worthy  as  well  as  of  what 
was  much  better,  he  seems  the  shadowing  forth, 
as  the  type  of  the  possible  future  American,  bred 
from  the  best  of  the  world's  stock,  in  the  largest 
of  the  world's  pastures,  and  destined,  if  the  destiny 
of  the  world  is  towards  perfection,  to  justify  the 
faith  of  Americans  in  their  stock.  But  this  is, 
perhaps,  too  far  away  even  for  those  who  read  this 
to  be  able  to  say  whether  I  am  a  true  prophet  or 
not;  it  seems  to  me  that  my  country  is,  at  any 
rate,  destined  to  become  the  greatest  state  or  the 
greatest  failure  of  all  time;  and,  in  the  former 
case,  Lowell  will  be  remembered  as  the  first  in 
time  of  the  citizens  of  its  Parnassus.  I  have 
known,  loved,  and  even  more,  reverenced  Emerson ; 
have  known  well  Longfellow,  Holmes,  Bryant,  and 
most  of  the  men  who  in  that  moment  of  our 
national  existence  made  it  eloquent,  but  Lowell 
was,  I  think,  the  one  most  completely  and  largely 
American. 

I  doubt  if  any  foreigner  to  the  land,  and,  per 
haps,  even  the  American  of  the  future,  could  feel 
the  presence  in  what  Lowell  has  left  of  a  certain 
crisp  naivet^,  which  suggests  his  Hosea  Biglow 
rubbed  through  the  university — a  freshness  which 
in  a  curious  way  suggests  to  me  the  bloom  on 
an  untouched  and  scarcely  ripe  plum,  or  what 
to  an  extreme  classicist  may  seem  want  of  polish, 
but  which  is  really  the  New  England  impatience 
at  convention,  and,  if  you  will,  the  evidence  of 
the  stage  of  unripeness  of  the  national  culture  of 
his  day  (though  it  was  not  always  present),  and 


A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS         165 

which  seems  to  conventional  criticism  the  indica 
tion  of  crudity  in  the  poet.  I  think  it  was  in 
him  largely  due  to  a  feeling  that  what  was  best 
was  what  was  most  spontaneous,  and  that  it 
was  to  be  spoiled,  not  finished  by  the  retouching, 
that  the  poet  was  to  be  brought  to  perfection 
in  the  whole,  and  not  by  labour  over  the  parts, 
and  by  isolated  efforts.  If,  and  when,  the  educa 
tion  was  complete  the  instantaneous  work  would 
show  it,  seemed  to  me  to  be  his  feeling.  He 
said  to  me  once,  and  this  was  after  his  return 
from  Germany,  "I  must  read  and  study  more 
before  I  return  to  production,"  as  if  he  felt  that 
in  the  future  the  mould  must  be  polished  and 
not  the  casting. 

His  sense  of  the  beauty  of  American  landscape 
was  intense,  more  so  I  am  persuaded  even  than 
Bryant's,  though  less  in  the  nature  of  landscape 
painting,  and  more  as  background  for  human 
interest,  like  a  distance  of  Titian's.  The  passage 
from  the  Vision  of  Sir  Launfall: 

"A  single  crow  from  his  tree-top  bleak 
From  his  shining  feathers  shed  off  the  cold  sun," 

is  to  me  the  best  image  of  the  New  England  winter 
I  have  ever  read,  and  the  picture  of  the  winter- 
palace  in  the  same  poem,  though  of  a  mingled 
fancy  and  imagination,  like  so  much  of  Lowell's 
poetry,  is  a  study  in  the  marshes  of  the  Charles 
River  meadows  at  a  winter  low-tide,  with  the 
thermometer  at  Zero  Fahrenheit.  And  what  was 
in  his  work  the  best  painted  landscape,  was,  un- 


166         A  FEW  OF  LOWELL'S  LETTERS 

mistakably,  American  subject ;  the  bracing  winter, 
the  rapid  and  bursting  spring,  the  Indian  summer, 
are  all  treated  as  not  even  Bryant  would  or  could 
have  treated  them.  It  was  enough  that  a  thing 
was  peculiarly  American  that  he  should  love  it 
with  all  his  heart ;  not  in  chauvinistic  narrow 
ness  of  feeling  —  and  no  one  who  knew  him  in 
England  could  doubt  that — but  in  the  passionate 
preference  for  his  childhood's  surroundings,  which 
was  willing  to  see  in  the  crudeness  of  the  New 
England  landscape,  with  its  rail  fences  and  its 
white  -  painted  farmhouses  and  its  utilitarian 
uniformity,  the  bare  canvasses  on  which  his 
fancy  painted  the  memories  of  boyhood,  and  in 
which  all  that  was  most  tender  in  the  past,  of 
mother  and  son,  of  wife  and  husband,  of  the 
graves  where  he  laid  his  first-born,  and — 

"That  blinding  anguish  of  forsaken  clay" 

which  was  his  first  bereavement — every  form  and 
phase  of  all  that  was  material  around  him  was 
in  this  wise  mixed  with  the  purest  passions  human 
nature  is  capable  of.  Through  all  the  home-poems 
Lowell  has  left  runs  this  golden  thread  of  sun 
shine  from  the  sun  which  shone  in  the  days  of 
a  pure  and  exalted  youth,  whose  dreams  and 
memories  are  better  and  dearer  than  the  realities 
of  the  most  prosperous  later  life.  In  the  warmth 
of  this  light  all  Lowell's  imagery  is  more  or  less 
steeped,  and  the  landscape  which  the  landscape 
painter  turns  from  as  beyond  pictures,  was  the 
ever-beautiful  world  in  which  Lowell  lived.  It 


167 

may  be  the  fancy  of  one  to  whom  the  man  was 
dear  as  woman,  but  to  me  the  passionate  purity 
of  Lowell's  life  glows  in  his  poetry;  and  this,  as 
well  as  other  associations  which  are  beyond  im 
parting,  blind  the  critic  in  me. 

"  What  words  divine  of  lover  or  of  poet 
Could  tell  our  love  and  make  thee  know  it  ?  " 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

THAT  no  grave  inquiry  into  the  causes  of  the 
decline  in  art  in  modern  times  should  have  taken 
place  at  a  time  when  scientific  investigation 
ranges  over  every  branch  of  human  cognitions, 
is  only  to  be  explained  by  the  conviction  held 
even  in  highly  organised  political  communities, 
that  art  in  general  has  no  especial  function  in 
a  national  life,  and  may  be  left  out  of  the  curri 
culum  of  the  citizen  of  the  world  and  he  be 
none  the  worse  citizen  for  it,  or  that  art  is 
merely  the  representation  of  nature's  facts  and 
so  simply  the  accessory  to  science,  and  as  such 
comprehended  in  it.  But  we  have  the  unques 
tionable  fact  that  every  nation  which  has  pro 
gressed  beyond  the  most  primitive  barbarism, 
has,  before  beginning  that  phase  of  civilisation 
which  is  characterised  mainly  by  the  accumula 
tion  of  superfluities,  been  most  intensely  interested 
in  and  largely  influenced  by  not  only  poetry  and 
music,  but  that  process  of  beautifying  one's  self 
and  surroundings  which  is  the  vital  principle  of 
art.  "Ornament  was  before  dress,"  and  the  daily 
lives  of  innumerable  artists  prove  that  a  man  may 
be  content  with  deprivation  of  a  serious  character 
and  be  happy  even  in  unrecompensed  devotion 
to  art;  the  ambition  of  life  satisfied  with  vic- 

168 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  169 

tories  that  have  no  victims,  and  gains  that  make 
no  one  the  poorer.  It  is  a  question  philosophy 
may  well  take  up  in  earnest :  how  far  the  strain 
of  modern  life,  the  inordinate  inequalities  in 
society,  and  the  extravagance  of  large  classes  of 
it,  might  be  modified  by  restoring  the  arts,  as 
far  as  cultivation  can  accomplish  it,  to  the  in 
fluence  they  held  in  the  life  of  Greece  in  500 
to  400  B.C.,  and  more  or  less  as  long  as  the 
Greeks  remained  free.  It  is  perfectly  true  that 
art  has  seen  some  of  its  best  phases  coinciding 
with  a  debauched  social  condition  and  a  degraded 
national  life;  but,  in  these  cases,  the  art  itself 
became  rapidly  debauched  and  formal,  as  did  re 
ligion;  but  no  art  ever  originated  in  debauchery 
or,  in  its  noblest  alliances,  long  survived  a  healthy 
intellectual  activity,  more  or  less  accompanied  by 
moral  soundness.  In  the  best  art  of  a  demoral 
ised  people  there  are  visible  the  symptoms  of 
decomposition — moral  gangrene. 

That  art  is,  and  always  has  been,  in  a  sense, 
the  exponent  of  the  real  character  of  a  nation 
is  a  fact  noted  by  philosophers  and  writers  on 
art  for  a  long  time.  That  if  the  life  shapes  the 
art,  there  must  be  in  some  degree  a  counter- 
influence  of  the  art  over  the  life,  seems  to  be 
settled  by  the  laws  of  cause  and  effect,  as  well 
as  that  that  influence  might,  under  favour 
able  circumstances,  prove  analogous  to  that  of 
literature,  and  equally  important  in  its  cultiva 
tion.  What  is  certain  is,  that  in  our  veritable 
life,  the  purely  mental  existence,  the  elements 


170  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

which  comprise  the  various  forms  of  pleasure 
are,  the  normal  activity  of  the  intellectual 
powers,  and  the  perception  of  beauty. 

The  question  which  arises,  and  which  it  is  rash 
for  any  man  to  offer  a  reply  to,  is  this :  Has 
modern  life  become  so  differentiated  from  that 
of  the  early  stages  of  human  existence  that  the 
influence  of  beauty  and  the  dependent  influence 
of  art  become  no  longer  essential  to  the  health 
ful  progress  of  the  human  intellect  ?  And  beyond 
this  lies  a  question  to  which  Plato  gives  an  un 
hesitating  answer:  Whether  beauty  be  not  the 
chief  witness  to  man's  immortality? — a  motive  of 
greater  moment,  if  such  a  thing  could  be  shown, 
than  his  present  content. 

I  indicate  this  scope  of  a  possible  inquiry  partly 
to  show  its  possible  importance,  and  partly  to  indi 
cate  the  particular  branch  of  it  which  I  wish  now 
to  examine.  Why  have  the  arts  of  design  steadily 
and  everywhere  fallen  off  in  excellence  and  in 
fluence  in  modern  times?  On  the  philosophical 
side  it  would  be  easy  to  answer  that  it  was  due 
to  the  materialism  of  the  modern  life;  but  this, 
while  perfectly  true,  is  still  a  remote  cause,  be 
cause  we  have,  in  individual  cases,  found  gross 
materialism  in  the  artist  not  inconsistent  with 
grandeur  and  great  power  in  his  art.  A  certain 
analogy  between  religion  and  art  is  found  in 
the  relation  of  both  to  modern  scientific  research. 
The  spirit  of  exact  inquiry,  arxl  the  limitation 
of  our  cognitions  to  material  and  demonstrable 
phenomena,  is  waging  war  on  that  entire  range 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  171 

of  spiritual  faculties,  perceptions,  emotions,  on 
which  all  religious  systems  have  been  founded 
and  in  which  lie  the  true  roots  of  art.  Is  the 
decay  of  art  due  to  the  same  tendencies  ?  If  yes, 
is  it  not  clear  that  the  official  and  collective 
efforts  to  restore  art  are  as  futile  for  this  restora 
tion  as  those  of  state  churches  to  reform  our 
morality?  Nevertheless,  there  is  to  most  minds, 
even  scientific,  an  indefinable  and  inevitable  re 
cognition  of  something,  beyond  and  above,  which 
has  not  fallen  under  these  attacks  and  which  we 
must  find  out. 

But  science  and  nature  cannot  go  wrong.  In 
the  light  of  positive  knowledge  and  physical  de 
monstration  we  cannot  regret  beliefs  whose  bases 
are  disproved.  It  is  useless  to  shut  out  light.  If 
we  must  face  the  destruction  of  the  ideal,  let  us 
accept  the  inevitable  with  at  least  the  courage  of 
the  ignorant  and  fanatic,  and  not  waste  strength 
in  defence  of  delusions.  Yet  there  is,  perhaps, 
more  danger  in  the  too  hasty  deduction  of  truth 
from  phenomena  than  in  delaying  our  adhesions 
to  what  seem  well-proved  facts.  We  have  always 
a  right  to  wait,  and,  remembering  past  revolu 
tions  of  thought,  to  question  finality  in  human 
discovery ;  while  admitting,  as  an  abstract  ques 
tion,  that  exact  science  must  lead  ultimately  to 
final  truth.  And  convinced  of  this,  I  still  believe 
in  Religion,  and,  as  I  am  not  without  hope  that 
Science  may  some  day  show  us  immortality,  and 
that  matter  is  not  all,  so  I  trust  that  we  shall 
find  even  in  the  Actual  the  proof  that  the  Ideal 


172  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

is  something  better  and  nobler  than  the  Actual's 
accidental  results,  and  that  Art  is  no  more  bound 
to  follow  Nature  than  Religion  to  serve  Science. 

I  have  no  intention  here  to  attack  this  compli 
cated  and  contested  question,  and  have  thus  far 
approached  it  only  to  show  on  what  ground  and  by 
what  analogies,  amongst  others,  the  legitimacy  and 
supremacy  of  subjective  or  ideal  art  can  be  sup 
ported.  For  at  present  we  have  to  deal  with  two 
distinct  forms  of  so-called  art,  of  which  the  elder 
and  true  form,  the  subjective,  is  an  art  of  ex 
pression,  whereof  the  vital  quality  is  that  it  shall 
convey,  not  the  facts  and  actual  phenomena  which 
constitute  the  anatomy  of  nature,  but  the  emotions 
and  impressions  of  the  artist,  in  which  all  the 
visible  forms  are  but  the  symbols  of  language 
in  which  the  artist,  without  any  restriction  of 
realistic  fidelity,  shall  show  forth  what  he  con 
siders  artistic  truth  or  ideal  beauty  in  any  of  its 
related  forms  of  positive  or  negative.  The  other 
form,  objective,  or  realistic  art,  which  is  entirely 
the  development  of  the  naturalistic  spirit,  depends, 
for  its  relative  value  and  standing,  upon  the  fidelity 
which  it  shows  to  natural  phenomena — it  is  the  art, 
if  it  be  art,  of  facts  and  physics,  of  the  anatomist, 
the  geologist,  the  botanist,  and  the  portraitist. 
The  methods,  the  appeals,  the  faculties,  and  the 
results  of  these  two  are  antithetical  —  they  are 
related  as  science  and  poetry,  or,  to  use  a  less 
generally  comprehensible,  but  by  genuine  art 
students  perfectly  understood,  comparison,  as  Truth 
and  Fact;  one  free  with  all  the  liberty  of  the 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  173 

imaginative  life,  and  the  other  bound  in  obedience 
to  the  accidents  of  nature.  It  is  the  former  of  these 
which  has  fallen  into  decay  and  which  is  the 
subject  of  our  inquiry.  But  en  passant,  I  will  call 
attention  to  the  fact  which  explains  itself,  that  the 
noblest  technique  has  arisen  in  the  art  of  expres 
sion,  and  that,  for  certain  forms  of  it,  we  have  to 
seek  the  highest  in  antique  or  Renaissance  art. 

The  realistic  or  naturalistic  art  is  a  purely 
modern  conception.  It  had  been  long  foreshadowed 
by  a  literary  movement,  whereby  the  great  in 
tellectual  interest  has  gradually  shifted  from  the 
epic  to  the  pictures  of  society  and  humanity  in  the 
modern  novel.  The  popular  literature  had  its  in 
termediate  phase  of  romanticism  like  art,  and  has 
finally,  like  it  again,  settled  down  to  questions  of 
realism;  but,  as  poetry  preceded  art  by  unknown 
centuries,  so  its  ultimate  development  into  the 
realism,  which  seems  the  chief  interest  of  the 
modern  intellect,  long  preceded  the  corresponding 
development  of  art. 

The  parallel  offers  interesting  study  for  thinkers 
on  all  the  forms  of  thought-development,  but  what 
is  of  especial  interest  from  the  point  of  view  which 
it  is  my  intention  to  take,  is  the  important  bearing 
it  ought  to  have  on  the  questions  of  art  education, 
in  which  our  society  seems  to  hold  so  high  but  so 
unintelligent  an  interest.  The  question  at  issue 
is  practical :  I  am  persuaded  that  a  complete  ex 
planation  of  the  reason  of  this  decay  would 
ultimately  lead,  firstly,  to  a  true  understanding  of 
the  proper  and  unique  value  of  the  arts  of  design 


174  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

and  visible  appeal ;  and,  secondly,  to  a  measurable 
restoration  to  their  true  and  productive  channels 
of  the  energies  and  appreciation  which  in  other 
ages  gave  us  an  art,  compared  to  which  ours  is  a 
pigmy. 

This  decadence  can  be  disputed  by  no  one  with 
the  most  moderate  knowledge  of  art  or  feeling 
for  it.  It  does  not  consist  merely  in  the  sinking 
of  the  ideal  standard,  or  the  incidental  variation 
of  national  temperament;  it  is  shown  in  the 
most  purely  technical  qualities,  as  well  as  the 
intellectual.  There  were  men  who  painted  con 
temporaneously  with,  or  immediately  after,  the 
great  Renaissance  painters,  whom  we  scarcely 
know  by  name,  yet  whose  work  is  frequently 
confounded  with  that  of  their  great  masters 
merely  on  account  of  its  technical  excellence. 
Without  any  intellectual  dignity,  it  shows  an 
executive  power  and  excellence  of  method  which 
no  painter  of  our  time  can  equal;  and,  even  in 
work  absolutely  unassignable  to  any  known 
painter,  we  find  examples  of  such  a  thorough 
mastery  of  the  material  and  power  of  hand  as 
would  give  any  living  painter  distinct  precedence 
in  modern  art. 

It  is  no  answer  to  these  statements  to  say  that 
our  age  does  not  want  what  past  ages  demanded 
and  accepted  as  the  best;  that  Titian's  work 
would  not  find  purchasers  if  done  to-day;  and 
that  no  one  would  go  to  see  the  Sistine  Chapel 
if  a  living  painter  had  painted  it — the  fact  re 
mains  that  no  one  to-day  can  do  the  work  of 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  175 

Titian  even  with  Titian's  doing  of  it  before  him, 
and  that  no  man  living  can  match  a  study  of 
Michael  Angelo  for  one  of  his  figures,  not  to 
speak  of  his  Sistine  Chapel. 

I  will  not  go  back  to  Greek  sculpture,  whose 
supremacy  no  one  contests,  but  only  to  that 
lovely  and  faithful  dream  of  it  which  came  with 
the  Italian  Renaissance  in  the  works  of  the 
Pisani,  Mino  Da  Fiesole,  Donatello,  Michael 
Angelo,  Giovanni  da  Bologna,  all  men  who  had 
caught  the  spirit  of  Greek  art  however  much 
they  faltered  and  wavered  in  giving  it  form,  and 
challenge  the  eighteenth  or  nineteenth  centuries 
to  show  us  anything  born  of  the  same  heaven 
and  earth.  Of  the  great  painters  of  the  same 
epoch  of  art  development  we  have  no  more  a 
single  peer  in  the  modern  schools  —  Dore  for 
Buonarotti,  Makart  for  Veronese,  Munkacsy  for 
Tintoretto,  Ingres  for  Raphael,  and  Delacroix 
for  Titian. 

And,  in  spite  of  all  this,  we  pay  artists  as 
artists  never  were  paid  before,  unless  by  the 
caprice  of  some  reckless  or  imperial  spendthrift 
in  exceptional  cases;  munificence  becomes  ex 
travagance,  prodigality,  and  what  we  get  for  its 
highest  prices  is  Meissonier  and  Millais;  for 
schools  we  have  the  Royal  Academy,  South 
Kensington,  the  Nicole  des  Beaux  Arts,  and  cruder 
American  imitations;  but  Meissonier  stands  at 
the  head  of  orthodox  art  in  France,  as  Millais 
did  in  England.  Nor  is  it  merely  a  question 
of  national  temperament  —  the  countrymen  of 


176  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

Velasquez,  of  Rubens,  of  Titian,  of  Holbein  are 
in  no  other  plight  than  we;  still  less  is  it  a 
question  of  decaying  intellect,  as  the  mental 
activity  of  the  whole  race  shows.  Neither  the 
multitude  of  devotees,  the  intensity  of  application 
of  the  mental  capacity,  the  social  encouragement, 
nor  the  adequacy  of  pecuniary  reward,  is  lacking. 
There  are  many  painters  paid  as  painters  never 
were  before  in  proportion  to  the  art  they  pro 
duce — feted,  courted,  knighted  and  decorated ;  and 
the  further  we  go  in  this  road  the  more  is  art 
heartless,  mechanical,  vain. 

The  reason  is  to  seek.  Science  turns  her  back 
on  the  subject,  and  the  universities  dismiss  art 
from  the  category  of  studies  and  pass  it  over 
mainly  to  the  painters  to  discourse  on,  ignoring 
the  psychological  law  that  no  mind  can  be 
productively  analytical  and  synthetical  at  the 
same  time;  and  the  artist,  being  perforce  a 
synthesist,  cannot  be  expected  to  analyse  the  art 
which  he  is,  if  a  true  artist,  occupied  in  building. 
There  is  no  case,  except  that  of  Leonardo  da 
Vinci,  where  we  find  high  speculative  or  analy 
tical  power  combined  with  great  artistic  gifts, 
and  this  case  is  precisely  the  one  which  proves 
my  proposition,  for  Da  Vinci,  even  in  his  art, 
was  a  naturalist  rather  than  a  poet;  he  was  of 
a  generation  in  which  every  form  of  mental 
activity  and  social  movement  sympathised  with 
art,  and  especially  he  had,  in  extraordinary  degree, 
the  mechanical  gifts  which  have  so  great  an 
importance  in  technical  art,  and  correspond  so 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  177 

closely  in  their  mental  position  with  the  great 
executive  faculties  of  the  artist,  so  that  to  him 
painting  was  the  most  apparent  outlet  for  his 
energies.  Had  he  lived  in  our  age  he  had  most 
certainly  been  an  engineer  and  mechanician;  for, 
even  in  the  quality  of  his  art,  it  is  the  scientific 
and  imitative  elements  which  dominate,  while  the 
imaginative  and  emotional,  which,  above  all,  dis 
tinguish  the  great  art  of  all  time,  are  curiously 
deficient.  Of  a  sincerely  devout  though  question 
ing  mind,  his  religion  led  him  to  art  by  one  tie, 
while  the  difficulty  of  then  attaining  to  social 
position  without  high  birth  and  family  influence 
made  art  almost  the  only  avenue  to  eminence  for 
men  of  great  intellectual  activity,  disposed  neither 
to  the  church  nor  to  the  army.  And  as  it  was, 
we  see  that  his  art  enlisted  but  a  small  part  of 
his  study,  while  his  note-books  in  all  their  pre 
cepts  point  rather  to  the  naturalistic  than  the 
artistic  side  of  painting,  though  not  by  modern 
methods. 

Therefore  it  is  that  when  we  demand  general 
critical  powers,  and  such  analysis  of  art  as  is 
necessary  to  evolve  the  laws  by  which  its  study 
must  be  directed,  it  is  quite  useless  to  look  to 
the  artists  to  serve  us.  It  has,  indeed,  passed 
into  a  common  saying  that  an  artist  is  never 
a  competent  critic;  but  this,  like  most  other 
popular  proverbs,  only  expresses  the  vulgar  and 
superficial  side  of  the  truth  it  relates  to,  the 
truth  being  that,  while  artists  are  generally  il 
logical  and  one-sided  in  their  appreciation  of  any 

M 


178  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

special  form  of  art,  there  is  no  possibility  of 
being  a  competent  critic  of  art  without  some 
thing  of  that  technical  training  which,  when 
successful  in  a  high  degree,  makes  the  artist  of 
distinction.  If  we  could  but  collect  and  reduce 
to  system  the  occasional  criticisms  and  dicta  of 
men  like  Watts,  J.  F.  Millet,  Rossetti,  Dela 
croix,  Burne- Jones,  Th.  Rousseau,  etc.,  we  should 
have  a  body  of  precepts  and  criticisms  such  as 
no  writer  on  art  has  ever  given  or  can  ever 
give  us;  but  the  peculiar  form  of  intellectual 
activity  which  is  needed  to  put  this  corpus  in- 
scriptionum  into  a  logical  and  consequent  form, 
as  a  code  of  art,  is  not  compatible  with  the 
artistic  intellect.  Da  Vinci  began  such  a  book, 
but  it  still  remains  in  the  form  of  notes.  No 
man  not  practically  versed  in  art  to  such  an 
extent  that  he  can  at  least  measure  the  diffi 
culties  to  be  met,  and  appreciate  the  skill  that 
has  overcome  them;  whose  eye  is  not  trained  by 
practice  in  drawing  so  that  he  may  judge  dis 
criminatingly  of  the  forms  before  him;  and  who 
has  not,  moreover,  made  himself  thoroughly  ac 
quainted  with  the  body  of  evidence  to  be  collected 
from  the  great  work  of  the  old  schools ;  who 
does  not  know,  in  fact,  both  nature  and  art  by 
intimate  and  special  study — can  have  any  valid 
authority  in  criticism  of  art  in  any  form.  We 
have  a  much  completer  scientific  basis  for  criticism 
of  music  than  of  painting,  but  no  one  proposes 
to  write  musical  criticisms  without  mastering 
counterpoint  and  acquiring  some  practical  and 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  179 

executive  knowledge  of  the  elements  of  music. 
In  art  criticism  such  effrontery  is  of  everyday 
occurrence. 

It  is  one  thing  to  enumerate  abstract  principles 
of  criticism,  which  may  be  evolved  by  analogy 
from  well-ascertained  parallels  in  other  intellec 
tual  studies,  and  another  to  apply  them  in  such 
a  way  as  to  give  sound,  concrete  judgments  on 
particular  forms  of  art.  Of  the  former  kind  of 
generalisation  about  art,  we  have  many  excellent 
examples  in  the  writing  of  men  whose  opinions 
on  individual  works  of  art  are  absurdly  whim 
sical  and  inconsequent.  The  name  of  Professor 
Kuskin  will  at  once  be  put  forward  as  that  of 
the  critic  who  has  best  fulfilled  all  the  conditions 
imposed  on  the  ideal  critic,  and  he  would  be  a 
rash  man  who  contested  his  claim  to  the  first 
place,  or  his  splendid  services  to  modern  thought. 
But,  in  point  of  fact,  and  so  far  as  the  claims  of 
the  highest  art  are  concerned,  he  has  simply 
retarded  their  recognition  by  basing  all  his  teach 
ing  on  direct  study  of  nature,  and  insisting  on  a 
realistic  basis  for  art.  So  far  as  I  know,  the  best 
result  of  practical  knowledge  of  art,  applied  to 
the  elucidation  of  the  principles  of  criticisms,  is 
in  the  works  of  Mr  Hamerton.  Sir  Joshua 
Reynolds  has  left  us  a  series  of  lectures  and 
some  fragmentary  notes  which  are  of  great  value 
in  the  technical  education  of  the  artist,  but 
which  in  nowise  attempt  any  explanation  of  the 
principles  of  art  from  the  logical  side,  or  trench 
on  its  philosophy. 


180  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

The  German  philosophers  have,  on  the  other 
hand,  contributed  much  valuable  material  to  the 
study  of  that  philosophy,  and  we  owe  to  them 
such  basis  for  its  development  as  we  possess; 
though,  in  every  attempt  to  apply  their  funda 
mental  principles  to  education  or  concrete  criti 
cism,  they  fail  through  want  of  catholicity  of 
appreciation.  We  owe  to  them  the  clear  state 
ment  of  the  fundamental  distinction  between  the 
elements  which  constitute  the  dualism  of  art,  the 
objective  and  subjective,  as  well  as  the  formulation 
of  the  science  of  the  aesthetic.  Baumgarten,  to 
whom  the  honour  of  having  projected  this 
science  belongs,  defines  it  as  "the  theory  of  the 
liberal  arts,  inferior  to  gnoseology,  the  art  of 
beautiful  thought,  .  .  .  the  science  of  sense  cogni 
tion."  But  the  value  of  this  very  valid  advance 
in  art  philosophy  was  not  realised  by  Baum 
garten,  because  the  nomenclature  of  art  was,  as 
it  still  is,  in  no  state  to  supply  the  terms  of  the 
logical  discussion.  There  was  no  definition  of  an 
art  which  constituted  a  definite  distinction  from 
a  science.  What  was  an  art  at  one  time  became 
a  science  later,  and  the  confusion  common  to  his 
day  betrayed  him  into  an  inconsistency  which 
now  makes  his  essay  more  or  less  absurd.  But 
his  definition  of  aesthetics  as  the  science  of  the 
beautiful  remains  to  us.  We  are  still  too  much 
encumbered  by  the  nomenclature  which  betrayed 
him,  and  under  which  any  definite  assertion  may 
be  met  by  another  which  pre-supposes  an  entirely 
different  conception  of  art.  We  have  the  fine 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  181 

arts,  the  polite  arts,  the  useful  arts;  the  art 
which  is  simply  skill  in  doing  anything,  equiva 
lent  to  the  Greek  TC'XVT]  —  the  secret  of  doing 
anything,  the  rule  for  which  becomes  matter  of 
science  when  established.  It  may  be  a  trick  or 
it  may  be  a  Greek  sculpture  that  engages  us, 
and  we  may  have,  to  discuss  it,  masters  of  arts 
who  know  no  art.  An  artist  may  be  a  Titian, 
a  Beethoven,  an  actor,  a  dancer,  a  singer,  a 
juggler,  a  pickpocket;  the  tailor,  the  milliner, 
any  workman,  may  be  "quite  an  artist  in  his 
way."  How  can  we  define  art  or  the  artist? 
We  must  avail  ourselves  of  that  natural  process 
of  differentiation  in  terminology  which  is  con 
tinually  going  on,  and  according  to  which  the 
leading  claimants  to  the  general  rank  of  artist 
are  distinguished  by  their  peculiar  appellations. 
A  composer  is  taken  to  mean  the  writer  of  music, 
a  poet  the  writer  of  verse,  a  musician  the  per 
former  of  music,  and  the  performer  of  plays  an 
actor;  even  the  sculptor  has  a  range  of  work  so 
definite  and  distinct  that,  though  no  one  ques 
tions  the  quality  of  his  art,  he  is  generally 
known  as  a  sculptor  rather  than  by  the  wider 
term,  and  so  a  prevailing  (which  might  well  be 
made  authoritative)  acceptation  of  the  words  art 
and  artist,  when  in  nowise  qualified,  implies  the 
arts  of  design  and  those  who  follow  them.  Even 
in  the  arts  of  design  a  common  and,  perhaps, 
unconscious  distinction  is  put  forward  of  greater 
or  less,  one  painter  being  known  as  a  true  artist, 
and  another  only  as  an  unintelligent  imitator  or 


182  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

copyist.  This  custom  does  not  consider  photo 
graphy  an  art  or  a  photographer  an  artist,  and 
as  the  work  of  a  painter  approaches  the  quality 
of  photography  we  recognise  that  it  recedes  from 
art. 

I  believe  this  development  of  a  more  definite 
terminology  to  be  in  accordance  with  the  true 
philosophy  of  art,  and  that  it  points  to  the  severe 
definition  of  the  Artist  as  the  Creator. 

"  The  artist  saw  his  statue  of  the  soul 
Was  perfect ;   so  with  one  regretful  stroke 
The  earthen  model  into  fragments  broke, 
And  without  her  the  impoverished  seasons  roll." 

The  supreme  artist  is  the  idealist,  and  the  imi 
tator  of  nature  is  the  artist  only  in  a  lower  and 
secondary  sense,  and  this  distinction  has  become  a 
differentiated  conclusion  in  general  English  speech 
and  thought.  Baumgarten's  aesthetics,  the  science 
of  the  beautiful,  is,  therefore,  the  science  of  art  in 
its  restricted  sense  of  design ;  and  design,  in  its 
severe  and  only  logical  sense,  is  the  creation  (from 
the  material  stored  in  the  imagination)  of  a  visible 
ideal.  We  can  in  nowise  admit  to  a  parity  with 
the  idealist  any  realist,  no  matter  how  trium 
phant.  The  question  is  not  one  of  comparison,  but 
of  contrast;  the  distinction  is  radical;  it  is  that 
between  poetry  and  science,  the  imagination  and 
simple  vision.  Extreme  illustrations  will  be  found 
in  J.  F.  Millet  and  Meissonier,  each  magnificent 
examples  of  the  two  classes  of  minds,  each  success 
ful  in  its  aim,  and  each,  alas !  a  type  as  well  of  the 
estimation  in  which  modern  society  hold  them : 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  183 

Millet,  the  most  subtle  and  masterly  example  of 
the  pure  Greek  method  of  approaching  art,  dying  in 
comparative  poverty  and  neglect;  and  Meissonier, 
the  extreme  manifestation  of  the  purely  modern 
spirit,  realism  reduced  to  its  last  expression, 
wealthy  and  idolised,  the  object  of  the  shallow 
enthusiasms  of  a  society  that  hardly  cares  to  study 
what  it  admires.  It  is  impossible,  on  any  sound 
theory  of  art,  to  put  together  work  so  radically, 
as  well  as  superficially,  distinct — no  rules  of  criti 
cism  or  precept  of  schools  will  embrace  both. 

To  contribute  ever  so  little  to  the  clear  setting 
forth  of  those  cardinal  distinctions,  which  must 
underlie  all  productive  criticism  and  so  aid  in 
forming  a  sound  theory  of  art  education,  it  is 
necessary  to  go  back  to  the  radical  distinctions 
between  these  two  kinds  of  art,  and  to  make  it 
impossible  to  confound  the  paths  of  approach.  It 
may  be  possible  to  walk  alternately  in  both  if  it 
were  desirable,  but  it  ought  not  to  be  possible  to 
confound  them  or  mistake  one  for  the  other. 

Professor  Ruskin,  with  all  his  power  and 
subtlety  of  thought  (and  I  regard  the  second 
volume  of  "  Modern  Painters "  the  most  pregnant 
contribution  of  our  generation  to  a  sound  aes 
thetic  literature),  has,  me  judice,  missed  the  re 
forms  he  had  at  heart  by  his  rejection  in  theory 
and  practice  of  the  fundamental  distinction  of 
objective  and  subjective,  and  by  his  insistence 
on  rigid  realisation  of  nature  as  a  method  of  art 
education.  That  element  in  art  which  makes  it 
such  is  not  its  fidelity  to  nature  but  its  personality  ; 


184  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

the  way  in  which  the  artist  arranges,  subordinates, 
harmonises  the  material  which  he  borrows  or  in 
vents;  in  the  majesty  or  sweetness  of  his  com 
position,  the  harmony  and  pathos  or  splendour  of 
his  colour;  all  those  things  which  in  poetry,  in 
music,  give  rank  as  poet  or  musician.  The  law  is 
the  same  in  all  the  arts  ;  it  is  always  the  subjective 
element  which  determines  the  place  of  the  artist. 
In  music  and  in  poetry  there  is  no  room  for 
confusion  on  this  subject;  and,  to  one  who  will 
reflect,  it  is  no  less  clear  that  the  whole  power 
of  painting  over  the  emotions  is  due  to  qualities 
which  are  entirely  independent  of  any  question  of 
representation  of  natural  objects.  Even  is  it  true 
that  the  glow  of  sunset  and  the  gloom  of  twilight 
owe  their  fascination  and  the  power  they  have  over 
the  artist  mainly  to  the  liberty  they  give  to  escape 
from  the  facts  of  nature,  from  the  domination  of 
an  inflexible  materialism.  If  painting  owed  its 
power  to  the  representation  of  nature,  the  noon 
day  should  have  more  value  to  the  painter  than  the 
evening,  which  everybody  knows  is  not  the  fact,  and 
as  twilight,  as  phenomenon,  has  no  more  value  or 
rarity  than  daylight,  it  appears  that  the  value  it 
has  is  in  a  certain  correspondence  with  moods  of 
the  mind  more  grateful  and  potent  than  the 
perception  of  facts.  This  points  to  a  metaphysical 
investigation,  in  which  I  do  not  enter  farther  than 
to  state  my  conclusion  that  twilight  and  others 
of  the  greater  phases  of  nature,  which  have  a 
special  artistic  appeal,  owe  it,  not  to  the  fact  that 
they  are  forms  of  phenomena,  but  to  the  relation 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  185 

between  them  and  certain  moods  inherent  in  the 
human  mind — i.e.,  to  their  subjectivity,  just  as, 
in  a  larger  way,  physical  beauty  owes  its  fascina 
tion,  not  to  its  being  a  fact,  but  to  its  accord  with 
certain  unexplained  chords  of  human  emotion. 

Art  is  simply  the  harmonic  expression  of  human 
emotion.  Where  there  is  no  emotion  there  is  no 
art,  except  in  that  secondary  sense  which  has 
been  pointed  out,  and  which  relates  to  the  primary 
as  the  letter  to  the  spirit.  Nature  furnishes 
symbols  but  no  language.  The  arts  which  are 
the  legitimate  daughters  of  the  muse  are,  dancing, 
music,  poetry,  sculpture  and  painting — so  in  the 
order  of  their  birth;  if  organic  nature  has  been 
called  in  to  nurse  the  latter  more  openly  than  the 
former,  the  parentage  is  nowise  changed.  The 
entire  quality  of  all  art  is  misrepresented  and  mis 
understood  by  any  other  hypothesis.  The  law 
which  controls  the  poem  or  symphony  is  the  same 
which  guides  the  pencil  or  chisel  of  the  true  artist. 

That  all  great  art — be  it  of  school  or  individual 
— obeys  this  law,  is  capable  of  proof.  It  is  only, 
moreover,  as  part  of  human  life  and  motive  that 
it  has  any  claim  to  the  consideration  we  give  it. 
If,  as  I  believe  to  be  beyond  doubt,  the  art  impulse 
is  the  first  of  the  humanities  in  the  race  as  in 
the  child,  then,  in  the  highest  conception  of  life, 
is  it  equally  true  that  art  is,  for  the  happiness  of 
the  race,  a  necessity,  and  its  wise  fostering  a  part 
of  true  political  economy,  of  which  human  happi 
ness  is  the  legitimate  end.  Every  human  being, 
in  proportion  as  the  child-like  nature  survives  in 


186  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

him,  is  dependent  on  art  for  his  happiness,  and 
the  happiest  are  those  to  whom  art  has  longest 
kept  its  realities. 

This,  in  most  men's  experience  of    their    kind, 
is  a  commonplace,  interpret  it  as  we  may ;  but  in 
modern  culture   it   is   ignored   in  a   twofold    and 
singular    manner.    Art    is    commonly   held    a  too 
trivial  branch    of    study  for  adult  intellects;   or, 
where  provision  is  made  for  its  culture,  we  ignore 
the    facts    that    its    roots    are    entirely    in    the 
emotional — i.e.,   subjective    or  poetic — i.e.,  creative 
(iroUw,  I    make)    faculties,  and    not    at    all    in    the 
objective  or  scientific,  which  latter  when  cultivated 
per  se  are  not  only  antipathetic  but  destructive 
to  art.    The  scientist  is  the  natural  enemy  of  art 
in  every  form,  as  the  scientific  tendency  is  to  the 
emotional,  which  is  the  indispensable  aliment  of  art. 
All  the  great  schools  of  painting  and  sculpture 
have  been  purely  subjective  in  their  origin  and 
development,  and  all  have    been    in    the    former 
purely  decorative;  abstract  or  subjective  forms  of 
decoration  in  all  cases  preceding  imitative  or  natu 
ralistic — an  unmistakable  indication  that  the  earli 
est  pictorial  impulse  was  creative  and  not  imitative. 
The  schools  grew  by  the  sapient  accumulation  of 
sound  tradition  and  the  development  of  the  ideal 
of    beauty,   always  regarded  originally  as    super 
human.     All  grew  up  as   schools    of    music    still 
grow,  and   to   all   these  came  a  time  when  they 
began  to  lean  on  nature-study  and  so  on  realism 
and  scientific  methods   of    looking   at    nature,  in 
which  were  the  causes  of  decay.    No  great  school 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  187 

ever  was  founded  on  the  direct  or  objective  study 
of  nature,  nor,  at  its  prime,  was  any  school  ever 
guilty  of  it ;  but  the  moment  the  subjective  method 
which  was  its  life  gave  way  to  the  objective  or 
scientific  method,  the  art  began  to  go  down.  The 
moment  of  completest  triumph,  in  which  art 
seemed  to  have  added  to  its  proper  charm  that 
of  the  realistic  fidelity  which  wins  the  universal 
applause,  was  that  in  which  decline  began.  This 
was  the  epoch  of  Praxiteles  and  Scopas,  of  Titian 
and  Raphael ;  and  when,  finally,  at  Bologna,  the 
academy  model  took  the  place  of  the  ideal,  there 
was  no  longer  any  hope  of  any  school  of  art. 

The  reason  for  this  is  not  difficult  to  state. 
The  genuine  creative  art  or  ideal  art  is  only 
possible  where  there  is  full  liberty  to  embody 
distinct  and  homogeneous  conceptions  which,  so 
far  as  the  word  can  be  properly  applied  to  human 
work,  are  creations;  and  here  the  mental  concep 
tion  must  be  so  clear  in  the  mind  of  the  artist 
that  it  serves  the  mental  vision  as  the  type  of 
which  the  work  of  art  is  the  visible  embodiment. 
In  all  great  design  this  vital  quality  is  most 
clearly  evident ;  but  when  constant  and  concurrent 
reference  to  the  model  is  kept  up  this  is  not  pos 
sible,  and  the  slightest  indication  of  the  model 
shown  in  design  is  immediately  destructive  of 
this  supreme  quality  of  art.  The  great  artists 
of  past  ages  have  left  us  no  specific  declaration 
in  words  of  their  recognition  of  this  law,  but 
the  internal  evidence  in  their  works  is  abun 
dant.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  Greek 


188  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

sculptors  never  worked  directly  from  nature, 
but  from  an  intimate  knowledge,  in  which  the 
perfectly-trained  eye  co-operated  with  the  habit 
of  working  from  an  ideal  developed  through 
a  subtle  sense  of  the  beautiful  in  form,  whereof 
the  complete  realisation  was  no  more  to  be  found 
in  any  visible  natural  type  then  than  now.  We 
know  the  same  to  be  true  of  Michael  Angelo ; 
and  in  all  the  work  of  the  great  painters  of  the 
Italian  schools,  we  find  constant  and  unmistakable 
indications  that  they  did  not  work  before  nature. 
Of  the  greatest  of  living  idealists,  and,  in  the 
noble  sense  of  art,  the  highest  modern  example 
of  the  combination  of  its  greatest  qualities,  G.  F. 
Watts,  we  have  the  distinct  and  invariable  rule 
never  to  work  from  the  model  in  any  ideal  (i.e., 
other  than  portrait)  work. 

Not  only  is  this  the  immutable  law  of  all  great 
art,  but  I  maintain  that  the  scientific  study  of 
nature,  whether  as  anatomy,  geology,  or  botany, 
is  obnoxious  in  a  high  degree  to  the  development 
of  the  great  qualities  of  design.  Beauty,  which 
is  the  loftiest  of  all  the  attributes  of  art,  is 
purely  a  visible  and  therefore  superficial  quality. 
To  know  the  structure  of  the  human  body,  to  be 
able  to  create  the  bones  and  their  articulations, 
the  muscles  and  their  insertions,  is  to  confuse  the 
ideal  perception  with  things  which  are  not  of 
vision  but  of  another  kind  of  knowledge.  We 
know  that  the  Greeks  had  no  knowledge  of 
anatomy  or  of  the  use  of  the  muscular  system; 
that  they  regarded  the  strength  of  the  body  as 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  189 

in  the  bones  to  which  the  muscles  were  merely 
protecting  cushions.  We  can  see  in  Michael  Angelo 
the  ostentation  of  the  anatomist  showing  through 
the  perception  of  the  ideal,  and  marring  it  in  spite 
of  his  immense  and  unapproached  imaginative 
power,  and  in  the  lesser  men  of  the  school  of 
Raphael  can  follow  the  decadence  that  came  from 
this  pride  of  knowledge.  But,  even  then,  the 
habit  of  direct  study  of  the  subject  from  nature, 
or  the  attempt  to  so  represent  the  scene  that  it 
should  appear  an  actuality — an  historical  tran 
script  of  the  scene — was  unknown. 

The  Dutch  painters,  though  they  sought  the 
most  trivial  details  in  nature,  never  became 
entirely  objective  in  their  work,  and  only  approxi 
mately  in  still  life.  In  their  landscape  and  sea 
pieces  the  colouring  and  rendering  of  detail  are 
purely  conventional,  and  aim,  not  at  reproducing 
the  colour  of  nature,  but  at  giving  harmonies  in 
various  keys  of  grey  colour,  and  at  expressing  the 
quality  of  natural  objects  by  peculiarities  of  exe 
cution  which  are  not  at  all  inspired  directly  by, 
or  true  to,  the  detail  of  nature. 

Down  to  the  last  of  the  great  schools,  that  of 
Rembrandt,  Teniers  and  Rubens,  the  deference  to 
nature,  except  in  portraiture,  never  went  further 
than  to  make  sketches  from  nature,  in  which  the 
essential  qualities  were  recorded  in  such  a  way  as 
to  leave  the  artist  at  full  liberty  to  modify  in 
his  painting  either  tone  or  form  to  suit  his  indi 
vidual  feeling.  Hobbema  and  Ruysdael,  who,  of 
all  the  Dutch  painters,  came  nearest  to  the  minor 


190  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

facts  of  nature,  clearly  never  painted  from  her 
directly  or  used  her  otherwise  than  as  a  vehicle 
for  their  ideals  of  composition  and  colour. 

That  true  and  delightful  school  of  English  land- 
scapists  which  began  with  Girtin,  was  completely 
subjective  in  its  methods  and  in  its  appeals,  and 
is  the  only  collective  movement  in  English  art 
which  deserves  the  name  of  a  distinctive  school. 
So  far  as  it  had  any  artistic  progenitors,  it  was 
due  to  the  influence  of  Claude,  Poussin,  and  the 
Dutch  landscapists,  but  with  a  robust  individu 
ality  and  fresh  poetic  feeling  which  no  other 
landscape  had  ever  shown,  a  near  and  intimate 
inspiration  from  the  larger  qualities  of  unsophisti 
cated  nature,  which  made  it  more  poetic  than  any 
prior  school  of  landscape  had  been.  Turner,  who 
was  its  greatest  master,  and  who  attained  the 
highest  expression  of  subjective  art  of  his  time- 
possibly  of  all  time — was  in  no  period  of  his  career 
a  student  of  nature  in  the  modern  acceptation 
of  that  term.  No  painter  ever  so  nonchalantly 
defied  all  the  actualities,  or  took  such  startling 
liberties  with  the  broader  verities  of  landscape 
as  he.  It  was  not  merely  topography  that  he 
upset  and  the  mountains  that  he  marshalled 
about,  but  he  outdid  Joshua  in  the  liberties  he 
took  with  the  sun  and  moon.  If  he  ever  realised 
a  tint  of  actual  nature,  it  was  simply  because  in 
his  chromatic  scale  it  happened  to  hit  the  note 
he  wanted.  An  audacious  defiance  of  facts  was 
not  enough ;  he  set  at  nought  the  larger  laws,  and 
his  colour  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  his 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  191 

career  was  a  constantly  widening  and  complicating 
scheme  of  chromatic  harmonies  as  perfectly  sub 
jective  as  a  symphony.  Light,  space,  colour ;  that 
subtle  synthesis  of  lines  and  forms  which  his  most 
influential  master  Claude  taught  him  and  which 
we  call  composition ;  modulation  of  tint  which 
never  left  a  vacant  space  in  any  portion  of  his 
work;  orchestration  as  complex,  as  masterly,  as 
ever  musician  mastered  —  these  were  what  he 
sought ;  and  if  the  forms  of  nature  and  her  com 
binations  furnished  him  with  the  elements  of  his 
work,  he  accepted  them  certainly,  but  with  the 
liberty  which  belongs  to  one  to  whom  nature  is 
a  useful  servant,  not  an  imperious  mistress. 

When  the  full  force  of  the  poetic  tendency 
which  produced  this  school  of  English  landscape- 
painters  was  broken  by  the  rise  and  fascination 
of  nature-painting,  I  do  not  know.  The  work  was 
done  ere  Turner  died;  and  with  him,  Linnell,  S. 
Palmer,  and  some  minor  men  of  the  same  general 
tendency,  the  school  disappeared.  It  died  out  as 
the  Greek  and  the  Italian  schools  had  died,  from 
a  method  of  study  initiated  by  portraiture  and 
the  sudden  recognition  of  an  interest  in  nature 
never  felt  before  by  the  general  mind.  The  Dutch 
painters  had  long  held  a  controlling  influence 
over  the  dilettanti  of  England,  as  painters  whose 
work  could  be  partially  understood  by  men  who 
had  no  knowledge  of  art — a  copper  kettle  of 
Ostade  or  Teniers  gave  more  real  pleasure  to  the 
average  buyer  of  pictures  than  a  Madonna  of 
Raphael  or  Botticelli,  though  the  Dutchman  only 


192  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

did  such  things  as  tours  de  force,  and  to  show  his 
skill.  His  system  of  study  was  still  more  subjec 
tive  than  objective;  but  when  the  modern  land 
scape  and  genre  painter  brought  into  painting  a 
clear  unconventional  way  of  seeing  nature,  and 
uncompromising  fidelity  in  rendering  facts  re 
quiring  neither  knowledge  of,  nor  feeling  for,  art 
in  its  public,  or  poetic  insight  in  its  painter,  it 
developed  intellectual  indolence  in  the  latter  and 
flattered  the  ignorance  and  conceit  of  the  former, 
and  brought  into  existence  what  is  commonly 
supposed  to  be  a  rational  art,  but  which  is,  in 
reality,  the  negation  of  art. 

There  is  one  interesting  phenomenon  that  is 
connected  with  this  arrival  of  a  school  of  art  at 
its  climax  and  its  subsequent  rapid  decay,  which 
deserves  explanation.  In  the  subjective  method, 
or  working  "  out  of  one's  head,"  as  the  common 
expression  goes,  the  mind  forms  certain  conven 
tional  modes  of  expression,  and  follows  these  with 
an  increasing  approach  to  fidelity  until  the  art 
reaches  that  point  which  we  take  for  the  acme, 
so  near  to  perfection  is  it  when  seen  from  our 
lower  plane.  Then,  whether  by  law  or  by  a  re 
curring  chance,  the  artist  finds  his  way  to  reali 
sation,  the  more  or  less  literal  reproduction  of 
what  nature  puts  before  him — generally,  I  believe, 
through  intellectual  indolence;  perhaps  more  or 
less  through  methods  induced  by  portraiture,  and 
persisted  in  on  account  of  the  charm  which  all 
men  have  felt  who  ever  made  a  faithful  study 
from  nature,  and  which  appeals  to  new  sources  of 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  193 

enjoyment.  In  the  satisfaction  due  to  successful 
and  complete  imitation  lies  a  triumph  far  more 
facile  than  those  of  the  ideal  method,  and  which 
appeals  to  that  general  appreciation  to  which  few 
men  are  great  enough  to  be  indifferent;  for  the 
artist  above  most  men  craves  the  appreciation 
of  his  fellow-men.  This  change  seems  to  have 
occurred  generally,  if  not  invariably,  at  the  close 
of  long  periods  of  purely  artistic  activity,  and 
after  rapid  increase  of  civic  and  individual  pros 
perity,  when  the  comparatively  uneducated  taste 
of  the  community  at  large  was  the  court  to  which 
the  artist  appealed.  Then,  with  this  lowered 
standard  and  sacrifice  of  the  ideal,  nature  became 
the  mistress  of  the  school,  and  the  old  way  and 
the  old  insight  departed.  Art  was  no  longer 
expression,  poetry,  but  a  representation,  a  simula 
tion,  more  or  less  earnest,  of  an  actuality:  first, 
history,  sacred  or  profane  or  commonplace;  and 
so  in  time  came  genre,  story-painting,  etc.,  etc., 
with  much  pride  in  rendering  of  stuffs  and 
illusions,  of  light  and  shade,  descending  to  a  kind 
of  intelligent  photography. 

And  so  it  happens  that  in  our  time  we  have  only 
sporadic  cases  of  the  true  method  of  the  study 
of  art,  and  that  beside  them  occurs  a  form  of  art 
which  was  never  known  in  the  days  of  the  ideal 
art — viz.,  the  strictly  historical,  of  which  Ford 
Madox  Brown  was  in  England  the  most  con 
spicuous  example,  and  of  which  much  might  be 
said,  but  by  me  at  present  only  that  it  relates 
to  the  art  of  the  ideal,  the  supreme  art  whose 

N 


194  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

loss  we  deplore,  as  history  does  to  poetry  and 
music. 

That  the  inspiration  is  not  extinct,  we  have 
proof  in  our  own  days,  in  France,  in  Delacroix, 
J.  F.  Millet — in  intellectual  ability  quite  the  peers 
of  the  men  of  the  great  schools — in  America,  in 
Allston,  and  in  England,  in  Watts,  Burne- Jones, 
Rossetti :  each  of  the  great  type,  eminent,  distinct, 
entirely  individual,  but  each,  unfortunately,  com 
pelled  to  work  out  his  results  alone,  groping  for 
the  true  method  by  the  aid  of  the  light  remaining 
to  us  in  the  works  of  the  great  masters  of  the 
Greek  and  Italian  schools,  but  with  no  leading  or 
following  of  their  own  time.* 

Since  the  days  of  the  great  Renaissance  masters, 
no  man  has  comprehended  so  fully  and  applied  so 
successfully  the  spirit  of  Greek  art  as  Watts,  and 
none  has  caught  so  perfectly  that  of  the  Renais 
sance  as  Burne-Jones.  Rossetti,  like  Turner,  stood 
alone.  He  even  less  resembled  all  his  predecessors, 
and  has  been  followed  by  no  disciples.  For  felicity 
of  imaginative  design,  nothing  in  art  surpasses 
some  of  the  work  of  his  youth  —  such  draw 
ings,  for  instance,  as  his  Cassandra,  Hamlet, 
and  the  Magdalen's  First  Sight  of  Christ;  or,  in 
chromatic  brilliancy  and  weird  harmony,  some  of 
the  water-colour  drawings,  all  drawn  to  the 
minutest  details  from  imaginative  vision.  What 

*  It  is  in  my  personal  knowledge  that  Mr  Watts  has  said  that  he 
would  have  been  a  better  painter  if  he  had  had  the  advantage  of  a 
training  in  youth  in  Titian's  studio,  instead  of  arriving  late  by  his  own 
research  at  the  proper  methods  of  execution. 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  195 

he  might  have  done  for  art,  had  his  life  and  health 
been  spared,  we  can  only  conjecture ;  but  what  he 
has  left  is  a  page  of  art  history,  brilliant,  indeed, 
but  even  more  suggestive  of  what  might  have 
been.  If,  again,  we  demand  technical  "mastery," 
the  knowledge  of  the  processes  which  are  required 
in  art  production,  that  which  was  the  qualifica 
tion  to  become  a  teacher  in  the  great  Italian 
schools,  there  is  only,  in  England,  W.  B.  Richmond, 
competent  to  do  in  a  workmanlike  manner  any 
work  set  before  him,  without  which  competence 
no  man  can  be  called  a  "master." 

The  public  of  to-day  prefers  a  form  of  art  which 
shall  require  no  previous  study,  and  make  no 
appeal  to  faculties  beyond  keen  optics.  It  likes 
work  studded  with  fine  bits  of  realism  and  whose 
story  lies  on  the  surface.  A  thoroughly  realistic 
perception  of  natural  colour  (not  so  common  a 
gift,  however,  as  the  public  imagines)  and  a 
masterly  execution  are  sufficient  to  secure  the 
painter's  position.  Imagination  and  imaginative 
fusion,  and  the  sense  of  ideal  beauty  which  make 
what  is  commonly  called  "high  art"  and  may  be 
called  true  art,  are  no  longer  necessary  to  place 
the  artist  in  the  position  of  authority  which  would 
give  rise  to  a  school.  The  great  schools  of  art 
were  founded  in  the  search  for  these  supreme 
qualities.  The  artists  went  into  them  as  students 
of  music  now  go  in  youth  to  study  while  the  hand 
and  thought  are  flexible  —  Titian  and  Michael 
Angelo  at  eight  and  ten  years  of  age — and  the 
whole  course  of  study  was  one  which  widened  and 


196  THE  DECAY  OF  ART 

deepened  the  intellectual  nature  in  the  direction 
of  art.  This  early  entry  into  the  school,  invari 
able  in  the  practice  of  the  great  schools,  is,  to  my 
opinion,  the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  any  mastery 
in  painting  and  sculpture  as  in  music,  or  in  the 
acquisition  of  any  other  language.  Expression 
must  be  unconscious  to  be  supreme.  The  minor 
men  were  caught  up  by  the  power  and  influence 
of  the  masters'  minds  into  the  majesty  of  the 
school,  and  the  masters  quickened  and  stimulated 
each  other's  genius.  The  morbid  vanity  of  indi 
vidualism,  tending  to  eccentricity,  did  not  carry 
men  out  of  the  sound  traditions  of  their  masters, 
but  the  true  scholars  laboured  collectively  for  the 
attainment  of  the  ideal  of  their  school.  Now, 
stat  nominis  umbra — there  is  no  school.  Drawing 
classes  there  are,  and  lessons  at  so  much  an  hour, 
but  no  masters,  and  therefore  no  schools.  The 
drawing  and  painting  classes  teach  technical  vir 
tues,  and  all — classes,  painters,  and  exhibitions, 
exalt  the  imitation  of  nature  as  the  end  of  art. 

The  end  it  is,  but  in  another  sense — its  grave. 
To  know  nature  and  employ  her  terms  for  the 
expression  of  the  artist's  ideal,  is  a  widely  different 
thing  from  the  imitation  of  her  forms  and  facts. 
The  former  is  an  education,  it  wakens  a  kinship 
to  all  great  thought  and  all  great  thinkers;  the 
latter  narrows  and  dwarfs  the  intellect  and  ex 
terminates  the  imagination.  So  long  as  the 
modern  thinker  only  accepts  realism  and  nature- 
reproduction  as  art,  art  education  must  remain 
a  shallow  and  unimportant  branch  of  modern  in- 


THE  DECAY  OF  ART  197 

tellectual  development,  and  art  stay  where  it  is — 
the  servant  of  all  fashions  and  fancies,  huckster 
of  stuffs  and  bric-a-brac,  tableaux  vivants  and  still 
life,  archaeological  restorations  and  mediaeval  poses 
plastiques — anything  and  everything  but  essential 
truth  and  ideal  beauty.  If  this  is  to  be  the  con 
clusion  of  the  education  on  which  we  are  concen 
trating  our  forces,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  say 
that  the  play  is  not  worth  the  candle. 


THE  REVIVAL   OF  ART 

IN  one  of  his  most  important  and  suggestive 
essays,  that  on  Culture,  Emerson  has  the  follow 
ing  sentence:  "Whilst  all  the  world  is  in  pursuit 
of  power,  and  of  wealth  as  a  means  of  power, 
culture  corrects  the  theory  of  success."  No  man 
was  better  qualified  to  estimate  the  qualities  and 
value  of  culture  by  his  own  experience,  or  to 
judge  of  the  dignity  or  the  reverse,  of  success, 
by  the  daily  spectacle  all  round  him  of  the  most 
successful  pursuit  of  power  and  wealth  that  any 
society  has  ever  afforded — viz.,  that  in  the  great 
commonwealth  of  the  American  Republic.  He 
stood  at  the  head  of  its  culture ;  and,  in  a  country 
where  intellect  has  only  to  choose  the  path  to 
power  and  accept  the  sacrifices  and  compensa 
tions  demanded  to  acquire  it,  he  remained  in 
different  to  it  and  the  means  to  it,  died  poor 
and  indifferent  to  politics  and  other  distinction 
than  that  his  culture  gave  him.  Emerson  has 
often  been  called  the  American  Plato,  and 
amongst  the  mental  qualities  which  justify  the 
claim  was  the  curious  insensibility  to  the  attrac 
tions  of  art.  Plato  had  no  place  in  his  com 
munity  for  the  artist;  Emerson,  in  a  time  and 
state  of  society  in  which  nature  has  brought  art 
nearer  to  the  daily  life  of  men,  through  the 
193 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  199 

invention  of  landscape,  photography,  etc.,  etc., 
remained  all  his  life  insensible  in  a  remarkable 
degree  to  contemporary  art.  He  felt  nature 
as  the  ancient  Greeks  seem  to  have  felt  her, 
apart  from  the  human  subjective  uses  of  her; 
and  this  trait,  in  the  mental  conformation  of  a 
man  so  typical  of  the  race  which  seems  to  be 
evolving  the  type  of  civilisation  for  the  next 
phase  of  human  development,  is  a  phenomenon 
which  invites  study.  We  talk  a  great  deal  about 
art,  and  spend  a  great  deal  of  time  and  money 
on  it,  but  it  is  a  serious  question  if  art  has  any 
more  hold  on  the  modern  mind,  or  has  any  more 
share  in  modern  culture  than  alchemy  or  astro 
logy.  And  when  I  say  that  it  is  a  serious 
question,  I  mean  not  only  that  it  is  one  that 
may  have  serious  import,  but  that  it  may  be 
seriously  held  in  the  negative  as  well  as  positive, 
and  seriously  debated.  But  to  debate  it,  to  main 
tain  either  the  negative  or  the  positive,  it  is 
necessary  to  understand  with  precision  what  art 
means;  and  if,  in  the  grave  deliberations  the 
subject  may  call  up,  it  should  be  discovered  that 
it  is  a  necessary  part  of  modern  culture,  this 
understanding  must  be  applied  to  the  system  of 
education  devoted  to  it. 

I  do  not  recognise  the  ignorant  and  substan 
tially  superstitious  respect,  often  amounting  to 
reverence,  for  the  artist,  and  begetting  an  im 
pulsive  patronage  of  him,  as  implying  or  leading 
to  a  knowledge  of  art — it  is  a  feeling  strong  in 
proportion  to  the  ignorance  of  art  in  the  indi- 


200  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

vidual,  and  is  a  phenomenon  of  the  religious 
nature,  a  shadow  of  the  lingering  reverence  for 
a  creator,  and,  as  given  to  art,  is  strongest  in 
weak  minds.  It  is  that  which  impels  so  many 
to  think  they  must  "do  something  for  art"; 
leads  to  some  intelligent,  but  more  unintelligent 
patronage  of  it  by  individuals,  schemes  of  art 
schools  and  art  education  by  communities,  in 
which  the  patronage  of  artists  and  fostering  of 
art  are  confounded — sometimes  identified,  some 
times  mistaken,  the  one  for  the  other,  to  the 
injury  of  both.  The  artist  is  no  more  entitled 
to  respect  or  charity,  much  less  to  reverence, 
than  any  other  brain  worker;  that  he  excites 
our  wonder  by  feats  of  legerdemain,  tours  de 
force,  tricks  of  the  brush,  or  audacities  of  tech 
nique  is  due  purely  to  our  ignorance,  and  counts 
for  the  artisan,  not  for  the  artist;  in  true  art 
the  means  are  so  completely  subordinated  to  the 
end  that  they  are  not,  and  ought  not  to  be, 
noticed.  Nor  is  fidelity  to  nature  any  more  the 
standard  to  which  we  should  bring  our  critical 
measures  to  be  tried;  the  photograph  is  truer  to 
nature  than  any  art  can  be,  and  is  yet  the  very 
antipodes  of  art.  Yet,  these  are  the  qualities 
which  determine  the  exhibition  success,  the  fame 
and  fortune  of  the  artist;  and,  by  the  theory  of 
success,  determine  the  nature  of  the  education  of 
the  artist  so  far  as  the  public  has  anything  to 
do  with  it.  The  dominant  virtues  in  the  general 
estimation  and  in  the  success  of  the  Royal 
Academy  exhibitions  are,  first,  clever  brush 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  201 

work  ;  and  second,  fidelity  to  the  facts  of  nature. 
And  with  these  ideals  in  view,  the  education  in 
art  of  our  public,  and  to  a  greater  or  less  extent 
of  our  artist,  is  shaped.  If  the  general  public  is 
content,  it  is  an  argument  to  strengthen  the  case 
of  those  who  maintain  that  the  uses  of  art  are 
matters  of  the  past,  and  that  of  its  finer  qualities, 
as  of  its  true  methods,  we  are  in  equal  ignorance 
and  indifference. 

And  yet  we  have  under  our  eyes,  and  held  up 
to  our  admiration,  the  products  of  the  two  great 
schools  of  the  past,  the  Greek  and  the  Italian 
Renaissance,  which  all  thoughtful  students  of  art 
recognise  as  beyond  modern  rivalries;  with  the 
contemporary  Japanese,  in  which,  with  an  antip 
odal  difference  of  motive  and  temperament,  the 
fundamental  system  is  the  same,  and  the  success 
due  to  the  same  processes  of  thought  and  work 
as  those  of  the  Greek  and  Italian  schools.  These 
processes  are  absolutely  antagonistic  to  those  of 
the  modern  European  schools  without  exception, 
the  difference  between  the  latter  being  rather 
one  of  processes  and  handiwork  than  in  concep 
tion  of  the  purposes  of  art,  or  more  or  less  vital 
affinity  with  the  essential  motives  of  art,  in  the 
correct  theory  of  it.  The  English  school  is,  with 
very  few  but  most  notable  exceptions,  only  an 
aggregation  of  more  or  less  clever  amateurs;  the 
German,  a  mistaken  philosophical  worship  of  the 
mass  of  matter  we  call  the  world,  and  humanity, 
without  a  trace  of  imagination  or  spirituality; 
and  the  French,  of  the  moment,  while  technically 


202  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

at  the  head  of  modern  art,  is  but  the  apotheosis 
of  brush  work  and  the  speculum  of  the  surface 
of  things,  as  devoid  of  vitality,  as  cold  and  sterile 
as  the  surface  of  the  moon.  It  is  useless  to  call 
up  men  like  Millet,  Th.  Rousseau,  and  two  or 
three  more:  they  are  voted  out  of  the  scheme 
of  to-day,  and  form  no  part  of  the  French  system 
any  more  than  Watts,  Burne-Jones,  and  Rossetti 
of  the  English.  These  are  survivals  of  a  condi 
tion  of  the  human  intellect  which,  though  once 
normal,  has  ceased  to  be  so. 

The  steady  degradation  of  art,  almost  without 
distinction  of  form,  with  only  rare  and  isolated 
recurrences  of  the  true  spirit,  from  the  six 
teenth  century  to  the  day  we  live  in,  and  which 
I  have  elsewhere  attempted  to  explain,  is  in 
itself  the  indication  of  the  remedy,  if  the  study 
of  art  is  to  be  healthily  revived.  As  an  evolu 
tionary  problem,  it  is  one  of  the  most  interesting 
and  not  the  least  important  in  the  history  of 
culture.  Is  the  question  a  purely  historical  one  ? 
Its  practical  solution  is  indicated  more  or  less 
clearly  by  the  analogies  of  every  branch  of  the 
history  of  thought,  and  is  shown  with  absolute 
precision  in  the  philosophy  of  the  arts  taken 
collectively,  their  individual  history,  in  which 
the  law  of  evolution  is  shown,  and,  if  we  would 
study  it,  in  the  development  of  the  individual 
artist ;  it  is  visible  in  music,  in  poetry,  the  dance, 
in  sculpture,  and  in  painting  —  sister  arts  where 
true  arts,  and  as  such  subject  to  the  same  laws, 
and,  in  fact,  only  various  forms  of  the  same 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  203 

passion;  that  of  expressing  our  emotions  in 
rhythmic  forms;  of  manifesting  in  communi 
cable  and  sympathetic  modes  and  ideal  types 
the  absolute  and  individual  self.  If  the  arts, 
born  of  one  motive,  appear  in  diverse  guise,  it 
is  because  each  of  our  faculties  demands  a 
distinct  appeal,  and,  for  the  satisfaction  of  its 
peculiar  emotion,  a  distinct  language.  In  each 
and  all  the  artist  is  a  creator,  borrowing  the 
language  of  nature  only  when  it  serves  his 
purpose;  but  he  is  nowise  her  clerk  or  mirror 
— that  is  the  mission  of  the  scientist.  But 
creation  is  governed  by  the  law  of  evolution — 
nature  did  not  escape  this  law  and  the  artist 
cannot — the  true  art  was  evolved,  the  false  art 
is  borrowed. 

Poetry  and  music  have  their  motives  and 
method  so  rooted  in  our  spiritual  natures  that 
they  can  only  be  degraded  by  sensuality;  but 
even  then  the  art  may  keep  its  fineness,  because, 
after  all,  the  most  intense  sensuality  has  its 
roots  in  the  spiritual  nature,  and  it  is  only  in 
its  escape  from  the  divine  order  and  precedence 
that  its  vice  lies.  The  dance  we  may  consider 
a  dependence  of  music ;  and  these  are  immortal, 
in  no  peril  of  extinction.  It  is  only  to  sculpture 
and  painting  that  death  can  come ;  that  form 
of  death  that  keeps  a  body  and  loses  the  soul. 
Materialism  is  the  deadly  enemy  of  all  the  arts; 
but  music  and  poetry  cannot  be  materialised: 
they  are  born  in  human  emotion,  and  will  only 
die  with  it.  Painting  and  sculpture  are  material- 


204  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

ised  by  subjection  to  the  facts  of  nature.  They 
draw  their  language,  the  prime  elements  of  their 
creation,  from  a  visible  world,  so  full  in  its 
vocabulary  that  the  artist  cannot  escape  from 
the  suggestion  of  its  terms,  if  he  would  be 
understood.  Colour  is,  and  in  its  highest  ex 
pressions  can  only  be,  subjective,  to  be  treated 
like  music,  orchestrally ;  but  the  element  of 
form  is  necessarily  dependent  on  nature  for  the 
intelligibility  of  its  terms  and  types,  the  artist 
having  only  the  faculty  of  exalting  and  refining 
her  forms  into  what  we  recognise  as  the  ideal; 
but  the  essential  condition  of  all  the  arts  of 
design  becoming  true  art  is  in  their  being  ex 
pression  not  imitation;  that  their  statements 
and  imagery  shall  be  evolved  from  the  mind 
of  the  artist,  not  copied  from  natural  models; 
be  creation,  not  repetition;  and  in  the  degree 
that  this  condition  is  fulfilled  does  the  work 
become  more  or  less  purely  a  work  of  art.  The 
form  of  materialism  which  menaces  the  arts  of 
design  is  therefore  science.  The  antagonism  is 
inexorable  but  logical,  and  the  position  cannot 
be  escaped  from.  Photography  is  the  absolute 
negation  of  art;  and  if  to-morrow  it  could 
succeed  in  reproducing  all  the  tints  of  nature, 
it  would  only  be  the  more  antagonistic,  if  that 
were  possible,  to  the  true  artistic  qualities. 
"The  letter  killeth,  the  spirit  giveth  life,"  and 
though  artistic  creation  does  not  involve  the 
creation  of  the  prime  material,  no  more  does, 
so  far  as  science  teaches,  the  creation  of  the 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  205 

world ;  the  old  material  takes  new  forms,  that 
is  all.  The  idealist  gets  his  materials  from 
nature,  but  he  recasts  them  in  expression;  the 
realist,  who  is  no  artist,  repeats  them  as  he  gets 
them.  This  is  the  fundamental  distinction  in  all 
design;  the  copyist  is  not  an  artist. 

It  is  this  and  not  the  choice  of  subject,  or  the 
more  or  less  decided  tendency  of  a  painter  or 
a  school,  which  constitutes  the  distinction  be 
tween  "high,"  or  true  art  and  "low,"  or  spurious 
art;  the  test  is  not  in  fidelity  to  nature,  but  to 
one's  own  self.  Giotto  and  Turner,  Orcagna  and 
Blake,  Phidias  and  Michael  Angelo,  are  alike  types 
of  the  highest  attainment;  the  modern  realistic 
(?  naturalistic)  painters  and  the  "Derby  Day" 
school,  the  incident  and  costume  painters  of 
whatever  school,  are  at  the  other  end  of  the 
scale,  more  or  less  redeemed  by  purely  technical 
power,  but  by  no  measure  of  it  to  be  raised  to 
the  higher  rank.  Not  that  the  distinction  can 
be  drawn  sharply,  so  that  we  can  in  every  case 
say  that  painters  shall  fall  in  one  or  the  other 
category;  but  just  in  the  proportion  that  an 
artist  depends  on  his  model  or  the  actual  material 
furnished  by  nature,  so  is  he  removed  from  pure 
art.  Nature  is  a  noble  mistress,  and  there  is 
nothing  degrading  in  the  most  absolute  subjec 
tion  to  her ;  but  let  us  not  for  that  confound 
the  distinctions,  the  recognition  of  which  lies  at 
the  bottom  of  sound  criticism.  The  painter, 
whose  devotion  to  nature  is  such  that  he  never 
leaves  or  varies  from  her,  may  be,  and  is  likely 


206  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

to  be,  a  happier  man  than  if  he  were  a  true 
artist;  but  he  is  not  an  artist  any  more  than 
a  photographer  is  one.  Michael  Angelo  studied 
the  human  figure  profoundly,  probably  more  in 
tensely  than  any  modern  painter,  and  worked 
from  the  knowledge  he  had  acquired;  but  it  is 
on  record,  and  is  shown  by  the  internal  evidence 
of  his  work,  that  he  never  worked  directly  from 
the  model  in  his  matured  works.  Giotto  very 
certainly  never  used  the  model  at  all;  and 
Turner  never  could  paint  from  nature.  To  men 
of  this  type  the  external  image  disturbs  the 
ideal,  which  is  so  complete  that  it  admits  no 
interference;  as  Turner  is  reported  to  have  said, 
"Nature  put  him  out,"  and  this  is  a  true  con 
dition.  In  Blake  it  was  so  developed  that  it 
became  a  morbid  vision. 

I  have  asked,  without  attempting  to  answer 
the  question,  in  a  prior  essay,  Is  it  necessary  that 
art  should  be  revived  to  the  degree  of  importance 
it  possessed  in  former  times?  I  think  not,  but  I 
hold  my  opinion  as  disputable.  If  the  contrary 
is  the  truth,  we  must  understand  the  law  of  the 
evolution  of  art  and  the  element  of  our  nature 
from  which  it  draws  its  vitality,  and  not  waste 
energy  and  existence  in  trying  to  make  figs  grow 
on  thistles,  or  art  at  South  Kensington.  Some 
one  said  long  ago  what  is  to  the  profound  student 
of  religions  a  fundamental  truth — "The  nearer 
the  church,  the  farther  from  God";  and  in  strict 
analogy  with  this  I  may  say,  the  nearer  to  nature, 
the  farther  from  art.  I  maintain  it  by  the  history 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  207 

of  art,  and  by  the  demonstration  of  the  law 
which  governs  all  the  arts  of  the  ideals,  as  well  as 
by  the  analysis  of  the  method  of  working  of  the 
individual  artist.  This  does  not  hinder  that  the 
church  may  become  the  guide  to  divine  wisdom, 
as  nature  may  lead  to  art,  but  never  through 
slavery;  but,  to  state  it  broadly,  the  subjection 
of  reason  to  authority,  or  individual  feeling  to 
the  hard  and  fast  aspects  of  the  physical  world, 
is  utterly  antagonistic  to  the  individuality  which 
is  the  end  of  the  development  of  the  man  or 
the  artist.  As  religion  was  made  for  man,  and 
not  man  for  religion,  so  art  was  not  made  for 
nature,  but  nature  for  art,  looking  at  the  matter 
from  the  artist's  point  of  view.  The  modern 
conception  of  the  arts  of  design  is  that  they  are 
intended  as  the  mirror  of  nature;  the  ancient 
and  true  one,  that  it  was  the  outcome  of  the 
emotions,  aspirations,  and  imaginative  or  spiritual 
conceptions  of  the  artist;  to  the  old  master  the 
facts  of  nature  were  the  vocabulary  of  his 
language,  to  the  new  they  are  the  types  of  his 
achievement;  the  former  employed  her  forms  to 
define  his  visions,  the  latter  only  mimics  them; 
the  former  expresses  an  idea,  the  latter  imitates 
a  surface.  Art  has  changed  its  public,  forgotten 
its  origin,  and  is  no  longer  the  teacher  of  hu 
manity,  the  message  of  the  gods,  but  the  syco 
phant  of  vulgarity  and  ignorance ;  or,  at  its  best 
— and  would  it  were  never  worse  employed! — the 
servant  of  science. 
Who  accepts  nature  as  the  supreme  authority, 


208  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

from  which  no  appeal  can  lie,  may  be  a  scientist 
but  never  an  artist.  To  the  latter  she  offers 
suggestions  but  lays  down  no  law.  When  what 
she  brings  him  suits  his  purposes,  he  builds  it  in; 
when  not,  which  is  oftener  the  case,  he  hammers 
it  into  his  own  shape.  Her  facts  are  accidents; 
and  what  he  wants  is  the  very  truth,  the  ideal.* 
If,  from  the  beginning,  his  visions  do  not  surpass 
the  actualities  he  sees  about  him,  if  the  passion 
of  expression  has  not  laid  hold  of  him  before  the 
love  of  nature  awakens  in  him,  there  is  little  or 
no  probability  of  his  having  in  him  the  material 
of  success.  The  evolution  of  the  individual  follows 
the  general  law;  and  that,  in  all  art,  is  that 
invention  precedes  imitation.  Pure  decoration 
with  arbitrary  forms,  generally  geometrical,  pre 
cedes  the  representation  of  natural  objects.  This 
passion  for  decoration  and  the  harmonious  ar 
rangement  of  forms,  sounds,  colours,  or  move 
ments,  is  the  essential  element  of  all  art.  The 
love  of  nature  is  a  distinct  and  completely  sub 
ordinate  element.  Without  the  recognition  of 
this  law  the  development  of  a  true  and  progressive 
art,  the  foundation  of  a  school,  is  impossible.  In 
music,  the  absolute  subjection  of  the  objective  to 
the  subjective,  to  the  complete  concealment  of  the 
former  where  it  existed,  makes  the  law  clear  to 
the  dullest  mind;  in  poetry,  it  is  equally  clear  to 
those  who  have  the  ear  for  form,  even  if  some 
times  confused  by  those  who  confound  the  dignity 

*  The  ideal  of  art  is  the  perfection  of  form,  but  in  nature  all  forms 
are  accidental  and  imperfect. 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  209 

of  thought  for  the  perfection  of  form,  or,  as  in 
Whitman,  mistaking  the  material  for  the  form 
and  ignoring  the  essential  distinction  between 
prose  and  poetry;  but  in  painting  and  sculpture, 
the  modern  doctrine,  ruinously,  as  earnestly  and 
eloquently,  maintained  by  Ruskin,  gives  the  ob 
jective  the  absolute  supremacy,  making  fidelity 
to  nature  the  standard  of  excellence  in  art,  com 
pletely  reversing  the  artistic  law.  Until  this 
heresy  is  recognised  for  what  it  is — pure  fallacy — 
the  arts  of  design  can  never  be  cultivated  on  the 
true  basis. 

What,  then,  is  to  be  done  to  bring  about  a 
healthy  revival  of  art  on  a  foundation  of  education 
which  shall  secure  its  continued  vitality?  I  am 
supposing,  for  the  sake  of  my  argument,  that  this 
is  possible  and  necessary,  of  which  I  am  not  at 
all  convinced.  The  first  thing  to  be  done,  in  the 
contrary  case,  is  to  banish  from  our  criticism  the 
false  standard,  and  admit  the  possibility  of  a  work 
of  art  being  the  better  the  less  it  is  like  nature  (I 
do  not  say  that  divergence  from  nature  is  neces 
sarily  an  approach  to  art,  but  that  it  may  be  so ; 
in  any  case,  the  fidelity  to  nature  has  no  relation 
whatever  to  the  quality  of  the  art) ;  and  to  estab 
lish  as  the  very  foundation  of  the  system  of 
education  that  only  the  impression  of  nature  is 
to  be  aimed  at,  even  if  it  is  in  contradiction  to 
the  facts,  and  that  memory  and  the  record  of 
impression  are  to  be  put  in  the  first  place  in  the 
acquisitions  of  the  artist.  We  cannot  go  back  to 
the  childlike  simplicity  of  all  archaic  art,  with  its 

o 


210  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

dominant  unsophisticated  rendering  of  the  central 
idea,  and  its  normal  and  evolutionary  attainment 
of  perfection;  we  know  too  much  of  the  fruit  of 
the  tree  of  knowledge  to  accept  its  greenness, 
and  science  has  already  too  much  forereached  on 
art  for  the  latter  to  begin  again,  with  the  capital 
of  the  days  of  Greek  myths  and  the  Italian  re 
awakening,  as  all  archaic  art  did,  surrounded  by 
the  circumstances  which  excite  the  creative  im 
pulse,  with  the  simplest,  most  direct  expression 
of  a  dominant  idea,  and  without  reference  to  any 
non-essential  facts,  time  and  ripening  knowledge 
adding  step  by  step  the  deficient  traits.  What 
is  to  be  done  must  be  done  with  the  recognition 
that  we  have  been  on  a  false  road,  on  which  we 
cannot  now  return,  but  must  find  the  best  cross- 
path  to  regain  it.  The  simple  satisfaction  with 
which  the  artist  in  the  childhood  of  art,  as  the 
child  in  his  art,  saw  grow  under  his  eye  the  image 
of  his  thought,  is  replaced  by  a  mixed  emotion 
in  which  the  knowledge  of  the  non-essential  is 
too  large  a  part  to  be  slighted  in  the  record. 

And  in  this  process  we  must  return  to  the 
springs  of  art.  The  law  is  the  same  for  all:  the 
young  poet  trains  his  rhythmical  sense  by  the 
reading  of  the  best  verse;  the  young  musician 
in  the  music  of  his  predecessors.  The  artist  of 
form  cannot  escape  from  the  law;  if  the  emotion 
which  inspires  him  is  not  supreme  over  all  fact, 
remoulding,  even  suppressing  or  reversing  it  at 
need,  casting  it  fused  into  the  mould  of  his  con 
ception,  if  he  does  not  accept  the  evolutionary 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  211 

law  and  absorb  what  went  before  him,  his  work 
will  not  be  art.  The  distinction  is  radical  and 
decides  the  very  life  of  work  or  worker ;  it  makes 
the  difference  between  science  and  art,  poetry  and 
prose,  music  and  talk,  dance  and  locomotion;  and 
the  system  of  education  which  does  not  recog 
nise  and  work  from  the  distinction  is  doomed 
to  eternal  futility.  From  this  there  is  no  escape. 
I  appeal  to  the  history  of  art.  The  earliest 
work  of  the  great  Greek  school  is  scarcely  dis 
tinguishable  from  the  archaic  work  of  all  barbaric 
tribes;  rude  attempts  to  make  visible  an  ideal, 
mostly  of  its  conceptions  of  Deity,  in  which  it  is 
impossible  not  to  see  the  analogy  with  the  first 
efforts  of  children  to  shape  resemblance  of  the 
things  they  love;  this  was,  and  is,  invariably  the 
presentation  of  conceptions,  not  studies  from  an 
object.  The  ideal  was  slowly  worked  out  by  the 
universal  process  of  evolution,  generation  after 
generation  working  out  the  same  problem  of  the 
ideal,  the  pupil  carrying  the  work  of  his  master 
a  little  further  as  he  perceived  the  incomplete 
ness  of  what  was  done  before,  but  always  in  the 
sense  of  more  perfect  expression;  finally  arriving 
at  a  perception  of  nature  idealised,  the  perfect 
types  of  beauty  which  no  later  epoch  has  re-dis 
covered.  And  to  the  thorough  student  of  Greek 
art  it  is  brought  home  by  a  thousand  details  of 
internal  evidence,  that  this  slow  attainment  of 
perfection  was  the  result,  not  of  any  system  of 
copying  nature,  but  by  the  gradual  evolution, 
through  centuries,  of  the  perception  of  the  ideal 


212  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

of  form,  attained  through  the  simultaneous  de 
velopment  of  technical  refinement  and  the  power 
of  retaining  passing  impressions  of  nature,  and 
through  the  mutual  reaction  of  these  on  each 
other. 

The  caviller  will  say  that  it  matters  not  how 
the  facts  of  nature  came  into  the  work — it  was 
the  nature,  after  all,  which  furnished  the  forms, 
and  that  the  most  perfect  of  the  Greek  works 
are  those  which  are  most  like  nature.  But  this 
is  not  true  in  fact,  and  is  utterly  false  as  general 
isation.  Nature  never  furnishes  a  perfect  form, 
and  supplies  us  with  no  criterion  by  which  we 
can  distinguish  the  more  from  the  less  beautiful. 
Nature  tends  to  perfect  beauty  when  she  is  re 
garded  as  a  whole  ;  but  some  of  the  noblest  Greek 
statues  contain  violations  of  anatomical  truth 
which  no  modern  French  sculptor  would,  or  dare, 
be  guilty  of,  but  which  were  intentional  and 
necessary  to  the  beauty  of  form  and  expression. 
The  artist  found  the  lines  and  forms  he  wanted : 
where  the  anatomy  came  right  it  was  because 
his  memory  was  precise  and  tenacious,  and  the 
facts  did  not  interfere  with  his  ideal  form ;  he 
saw  the  god  in  his  imagination  and  gave  him  the 
form  of  highest  beauty  as  he  conceived  it,  and 
when  in  later  days  he  saw  the  athlete  in  action, 
his  memory  retained  the  forms  that  gave  the 
figure  its  expression;  he  knew  nothing  of  an 
atomy  or  the  function  of  the  muscles,  which,  in 
the  science  of  his  day,  were  only  the  cushions 
which  protected  the  bones  in  which  all  strength 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  213 

was  supposed  to  lie;  his  vision  of  what  was  on 
the  surface  was  undimmed  by  theories  of  what 
was  underneath,  and  his  powers  of  observation 
of  every  variation  and  characteristic  of  external 
form,  and  his  retention  of  what  he  saw,  were  so 
highly  developed  that  the  use  of  the  model  was 
superfluous — his  vision  of  the  ideal  was  truer 
than  the  actuality  of  flesh  and  blood.  This  might 
seem  incredible  did  we  not  know  that  it  was 
the  case  with  Michael  Angelo,  who  worked  on  the 
marble  without  even  a  clay  model  to  guide  him. 

Taking  the  entire  course  of  Greek  art  from  the 
most  archaic  period  down  to  the  Pergamenean 
school,  we  see  that  the  development  of  the  per 
fection  of  form  was  so  slow  as  to  be  only 
recognised  as  an  evolution,  and  no  internal  evi 
dence  of  the  direct  copying  of  nature  is  to  be 
found  in  the  whole  field;  but  when  the  inten 
tional  fidelity  to  nature  becomes  evident,  as  in 
the  Dying  Gladiator  (although  the  pose  plastique, 
which  is  the  shadow  of  coming  death  to  all  art, 
is  not  yet  apparent),  we  recognise  that  art  is  in 
its  decline,  fidelity  to  facts  has  begun  to  shoulder 
the  perception  of  beauty,  and  the  reign  of  the 
ideal  has  come  to  its  end. 

The  same  phenomenon  appears  in  the  history 
of  the  Italian  Renaissance.  The  decay  following 
the  decline  of  all  motives  of  art,  in  Greece,  Rome, 
and  Byzantium,  consequent,  perhaps,  on  the  moral 
and  political  debasement,  had  brought  all  the  arts 
to  one  dead  level  of  mechanical  achievement. 
Byzantine  art  is  the  synonym  of  all  that  is  most 


214  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

mechanical  and  prescriptive,  but  with  the  posses 
sions  of  its  technique  much  was  prepared  for  a 
revival,  and  the  decorative  instinct  was  always 
there  potent  and  healthy.  And  out  of  the  sleep 
of  centuries  came  the  new  birth,  not,  as  the 
fables  run,  from  the  inspiration  of  a  single  man 
or  from  a  recognition  of  nature,  but  from  the 
general  awakening  of  the  intellectual  and  moral 
life  of  Italy.  Cimabue  was  only  one  of  its 
manifestations.  Sienna,  if  we  had  her  record, 
might  come  before  Florence,  and  certainly,  in 
her  Duccio,  was  superior  to  the  master  of  Giotto 
— I  am  even  inclined  to  believe  not  inferior  to 
Giotto  himself.  But  in  Giotto  we  have  the  sum 
of  all  the  qualities  which  told  in  the  revival. 
What  we  find  in  his  art  is  what  we  find  in  the 
early  Greek,  with  something  beyond,  due  to  the 
evolution  of  humanity  at  large  to  a  fuller  life 
and  a  wider  range  of  faculties;  but  it  is  an  art 
of  the  ideal,  not  of  the  model;  pure  expression, 
in  which  the  faculty  of  imaginative  vision  appears 
in  a  startling  power,  and  in  which  there  is  the 
clearest  internal  evidence  that  he  never  used  the 
model.  His  ideal  differed  from  that  of  the  Greek 
as  the  mediaeval  Italian  did  from  the  fellow- 
citizen  of  Pericles,  and  the  ideal  of  the  Renais 
sance  was  not  that  of  physical  perfection,  but  of 
spiritual  glory  and  struggle,  not  of  Apollo  but 
of  Christ.  The  intellectual  processes  are,  how 
ever,  the  same.  If,  in  the  work  of  Giotto,  the 
internal  evidence  of  the  purely  ideal  method  be 
obscured,  it  is  abundant  in  that  of  his  pupils 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  215 

and  immediate  successors,  whose  absolutely  sub 
jective  method  is  beyond  dispute.  And  from 
Giotto  onward  there  is  a  steady  development  in 
the  direction  of  a  larger  comprehension  of  the 
qualities  of  the  art  and  a  fuller  grasp  of  its 
alphabet;  though,  while  in  Giotto  every  detail  is 
a  part  of  his  story  and  in  his  successors  they 
become  more  or  less  conventional  symbols,  the 
underlying  idea  is  the  same.  The  undivided 
purpose  of  the  work  was  the  expression  of  the 
idea  which  inspired  the  artist,  never  the  repre 
sentation  of  nature  except  as  a  part  of  the 
vocabulary. 

The  climax  of  this  ecstatic  art  came  in  Fra 
Angelico,  not  a  great  imagination  but  a  wonderful 
visionary,  whose  pictures  are  probably  the  most 
perfect  expressions  we  have  of  the  purely  subjec 
tive  art,  produced  under  the  exaltation  of  religious 
emotion,  and  probably  drawn  from  what  the  artist 
believed  to  be  revelations  of  the  heavenly  world, 
and  actually  seen  by  him.  The  work  of  William 
Blake  was  probably  as  purely  subjective,  but  there 
seems  to  me  a  taint  of  insanity  in  the  vision;  not 
the  pure  ecstacy  kept,  in  Fra  Angelico,  a  con 
sistent  element  by  the  intensity  of  his  religious 
passion,  and  in  Blake  replaced  by  an  abnormal 
obsession.  In  the  work  of  Fra  Angelico's  great 
pupil,  Benozzo  Gozzoli,  I  find  for  the  first  time 
the  evidence  of  the  direct  and  prosaic  reference 
to  nature  for  certain  facts,  forms,  and  the  real 
semblance  of  the  personages  with  whom  the  artist 
came  in  contact,  and  who  became  to  a  large 


216  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

extent  the  dramatis  personce  of  his  pictures ;  but 
Gozzoli  only  made  drawings  from  the  person, 
which  he  used  as  memoranda  when  working  on 
the  picture.  After  him  the  practice  became 
general  to  draw  from  the  figure,  and  in  some 
cases  from  cast  draperies;  but  it  is  only  in  Fra 
Fillippo  that  we  find  the  employment  of  actual 
types  of  the  everyday  world  for  the  sacred  per 
sonages,  and  not  till  long  after  that  do  we  find 
the  posing  of  the  figure  for  dramatic  action,  while 
actual  painting  from  life  in  the  final  work  is  not 
indicated  till  we  reach  the  Carracci,  in  their  so- 
called  revival  of  art,  which  was  really  the  death 
blow  to  it.  It  is  probable  that  Raphael  and 
Titian  drew  their  portraits  from  life  on  the 
canvas  direct  in  the  preparation,  on  which  they 
afterward  got  their  colour  without  the  model; 
and,  in  the  case  of  Titianr  we  have  not  only  the 
internal  evidence,  but  that  of  tradition  to  show 
that  he  did  not  paint  from  nature  in  the  modern 
way,  but  on  the  basis  of  an  accurate  likeness, 
done  in  monochrome,  followed  by  his  conven 
tional  scheme  of  colour  in  the  conventional 
technical  method,  borrowed  from  Bellini,  and  con 
tinued  through  the  Venetian  school  till  its  close. 
All  through  the  great  period  of  the  Renaissance 
the  figures  were  evidently  drawn  from  know 
ledge,  in  many  cases  acquired  by  the  most  severe 
drawing  from  nature,  but  the  design  was  made 
from  that  knowledge,  not  from  the  model,  which 
served  merely  for  the  better  understanding  of 
the  subject.  What  the  Greeks  did  we  do  not 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  217 

know  by  direct  tradition,  but  we  know  that  the 
absurd  legends  of  their  composing  figures  from 
the  various  members  of  different  individuals,  a 
leg  from  one  and  an  arm  from  another,  can 
have  had  no  foundation  in  fact.  No  one  who 
knows  the  modus  operandi  of  the  artistic  mind 
can  be  in  doubt  as  to  that — no  ideal  image,  even 
of  a  landscape,  can  be  constructed  in  that  way. 
The  true  idealist  is  he  who,  having  the  most 
complete  knowledge  of  nature,  uses  her  materials 
freely  for  his  own  purposes.  She  has  her  laws, 
and  the  idealist  learns  them  and  follows  them 
as  far  as  they  serve  his  purposes. 

The  mental  operations  of  the  copyist  and  those 
of  the  idealist  are  diametrically  opposed,  whether 
the  former  copies  nature  or  the  work  of  another 
artist.  With  the  former  there  is  a  constant 
measuring,  comparing,  a  process  of  balancing  in 
the  mind  far  more  laborious  than  the  process  of 
expression  of  conception  in  the  imagination  or 
memory.  A  modern  school  of  painting  has 
assumed  the  title  of  "impressionist,"  apparently 
ignorant  of  the  fact  that  all  true  art  is  im 
pressionist  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  term,  as 
all  naturalistic  representation  is  science,  and  not, 
strictly  speaking,  art  at  all.  The  majority  of 
people  nowadays  prefer  the  latter:  they  know, 
more  or  less,  what  resembles  what  they  see,  and 
what  they  like;  this  world,  familiar  to  them, 
may  be  worthier  than  that  of  the  idealist  and 
artist;  that  is  a  matter  of  taste  not  of  discussion. 
But  let  us  not  confound  terms  and  definitions — 


218  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

if  what  we  want  is  art,  let  us  understand  its 
character:  if  what  we  want  is  nature,  let  us 
recognise  the  fact  and  have  done  with  it,  but 
not  wander  in  uncertainty  as  to  what  we  are 
talking  about. 

Much  of  the  confusion  in  the  world  of  general 
thought  on  the  subject  of  the  ideal,  is  due  to 
the  confusion  between  the  two  accepted  mean 
ings  of  the  word.  The  broad  and  comprehensive, 
and,  therefore,  the  primary  meaning,  is  the  de 
signation  of  what  is  present  to  the  imagination 
as  opposed  to  the  palpable  and  materialised — 
the  theory  of  the  thing,  as  opposed  to  the  accom 
plishment  of  it;  the  secondary  meaning  is  some 
thing  which  is  produced  in  conformity  to  that 
hypothetical  perfection,  because,  as  we  recognise 
the  imperfection  of  actual  things,  we  admit  that 
we  must  seek  a  perfect  image  in  the  regions  of 
imagination — i.e.,  of  ideas.  But,  when  we  come 
to  scientific  discussion  of  the  nature  of  art,  we 
must  recur  to  the  primary  use  of  the  term,  and 
recognise  that  whatever  is  the  embodiment  of  a 
mental  conception  is  ideal ;  and  in  any  possible 
combination  of  the  ideal  and  the  actual,  that 
part  of  the  combination  which  makes  it  art  is 
that  which  it  owes  to  the  mind  of  the  artist, 
and  not  that  which  it  derives  from  the  material 
world.  When,  then,  we  propose  to  cultivate  art 
by  setting  the  would-be  artist  to  painting  from 
nature  directly,  we  take  a  road  which  may  in 
time  permit  him  to  become  an  artist,  but  which 
is  not  the  true  and  direct  way,  and  which  may, 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  219 

indeed,  divert  him  entirely  from  his  aim,  and 
is  not,  therefore,  to  be  advised  as  the  basis  of  an 
education,  though  it  may  be  that  best  adapted 
to  an  education  in  what  I  will  designate  as 
scientific  graphics,  and  the  only  method  for  men 
who  have  no  ideal  faculties.  The  essential  con 
ditions  of  a  true  art  education,  if  we  are  to 
develop  a  genuine  school,  are  the  cultivation, 
above  all  others,  of  the  faculties  of  rapid  obser 
vation  and  retention  of  the  significant  facts,  and 
putting  before  the  eye  the  essential  truths  of 
what  was  seen,  memorising  the  flitting  panorama 
of  nature  and  training  the  power  of  conception 
and  the  imagination  by  exercising  and  depending 
on  them.  Hamerton  has  given  some  most  in 
teresting  observations  on  the  method  of  memoris 
ing  as  a  system  of  art  training,  and  the  history 
of  modern  art  is  full  of  cases  of  the  power  to 
be  so  attained.  To  work  from  knowledge  of  the 
reality  of  things,  rather  than  from  information 
of  their  superficial  aspects,  is  the  end  to  be  kept 
in  view :  to  get  rid  of  the  model  as  far  as 
possible  is  the  first  step  to  the  right  education, 
dependence  on  the  model  the  obstacle  to  it.  The 
shadow  of  science  is  the  eclipse  of  art. 

I  have  said  that  I  do  not  know  that  the  re 
vival  of  art  is  of  any  importance  to  humanity. 
I  admit  the  possibility  of  its  utter  inutility  to  the 
spiritual  or  intellectual  evolution  of  the  race,  of 
its  having  finished  its  work  as  an  agent  in  that 
evolution,  and  having,  in  general,  a  purely  his 
torical  value.  I  perceive,  in  the  study  of  its 


220  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

history,  that  there  have  been  epochs  in  which 
it  served  only  to  gratify  vanity  and  ostentation, 
and  it  seems  to  me  that  we  are  now  in  such  an 
epoch ;  but  as  in  the  past  these  morbid  conditions 
have  had  reactions  of  healthy  life,  it  is  not  per 
mitted  from  an  historical  parallel  to  conclude  that 
the  future  does  not  contain  an  art  as  genuine 
as  any  in  the  past.  But  two  things  must  be 
noted  by  the  philosophical  student — viz.,  that  the 
great  evolutions  of  true  art  have  always  had 
their  origin  in  some  general  passion  supervening 
on  the  love  of  decoration,  no  fiat  of  ruler  or 
official  forcing-process  ever  having  succeeded  in 
initiating  one ;  and  that  they  have  invariably 
been  followed,  and  been  stifled  by,  naturalistic 
tendencies.  Nature  has  in  every  case  killed  art. 
The  devotion  to  naturalism  has,  in  all  the  past 
schools,  been  recognised  by  thoughtful  criticism 
as  the  "decline  of  art."  The  reason  is  evident. 
The  servile  study  of  nature  supersedes  the  exer 
cise  of  those  faculties  on  which  I  have  shown  the 
successful  pursuit  of  art  to  depend;  the  vulgar 
taste  applauds  what  it  can  understand — the  super 
ficial  aspect  of  things,  imitation,  illusion,  etc. ; 
and  the  Academies,  Royal  and  National,  and  the 
various  societies,  in  their  exhibitions  and  search 
of  popularity,  follow  and  confirm  the  vulgar 
opinion,  which  can  never  be  otherwise  than 
grossly  ignorant;  and  only  the  artistic  genius  of 
inflexible  fibre  resists  the  current,  and  is  generally 
ignored.  The  annual  exhibitions  are  the  grave 
of  all  that  is  best  in  art:  individuality  of  the 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  221 

finer  kind,  refinement,  simplicity  which  is  a  form 
of  religion,  and  pure  intellectual  purpose  —  these 
are  trampled  out  by  the  eager  feet  of  those  who 
give  a  morning  to  the  work  of  a  year,  are  un 
recognised  in  the  competition  of  brilliant  technical 
surfaces,  and  are  finally  buried  in  the  ignorant 
comment  of  the  hurried  daily  press,  compelled  to 
pronounce  judgment  without  consideration,  and 
generally  without  the  most  elementary  know 
ledge  of  the  subject.  No  labour  of  any  human 
worker  is  ever  subjected  to  such  degradation  as 
is  art  to-day  under  the  criticism  of  the  daily 
paper.  Now  and  then  a  true  artist  fights  his 
way  to  his  proper  place  by  sheer  intellectual 
power  and  patient  endurance;  but  others,  as  true 
in  aim,  if  of  minor  force,  are  never  recognised 
till  they  are  dead,  if  even  then. 

Under  the  hypothesis,  then,  that  art  is  to  be 
revived  and  cultivated,  the  study  of  the  works 
and  methods  of  the  genuine  schools  of  art  in 
past  times  is  of  the  highest  and  primary  import 
ance — is,  in  fact,  the  foundation  of  our  schools  to 
be.  The  mimicry  of  ancient  forms,  the  adoption 
of  antique  or  mediaeval  themes,  or  the  affectation 
of  a  manner  that  was  spontaneous  to  a  mind  that 
came  to  activity  under  influences  utterly  diverse 
from  those  under  which  we  live,  have  nothing  to 
do  with  art,  and  in  no  wise  aid  us.  Whether  the 
Greeks  believed  in  the  gods  whose  images  they 
carved,  or  the  Cinquecentists  in  the  holy  men 
and  women  they  painted,  is  to  us  utterly  im 
material.  What  they  have  given  us  is  the  method 


222  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

by  which  they  attained  excellence  in  art,  and  the 
law  at  the  root  of  it.  That  their  faith  in  their 
saints  had  anything  to  do  with  that  excellence  I 
do  not  believe,  or  that  any  revival  of  such  faith 
is  necessary  for  a  new  art.  The  history  of  art 
does  not  indicate  it,  and  the  biography  of  the 
artists  denies  it.  What  the  old  art  teaches,  in 
whatever  form  it  took,  is  that  the  art  is  in  the 
artist,  and  not  in  nature;  and  from  Archermos 
to  Praxiteles,  as  from  Cimabue  to  Raphael,  the 
development  is  one  of  accumulating  knowledge 
going  hand-in-hand  with  an  increasing  skill  and 
technical  resources,  in  which  the  evidence  is  un 
mistakable  to  who  can  read  it,  that  the  study 
of  nature  was  indirect,  and  that  scientific  know 
ledge  of  things  never  came  to  disturb  the  order 
of  ideal  creation.  The  Greek  sculpture  was  not 
cursed  by  a  knowledge  of  anatomy;  and,  after 
Michael  Angelo  had  introduced  it,  the  sculpture 
of  Italy  became  a  mere  muscular  inanity.  We 
cannot  now  go  so  far  as  to  ignore  anatomy,  but 
we  can  cease  to  study  it,  and  recognise  no  more 
of  it  than  the  Greek  could  see  and  show;  no 
more  of  it  than  is  necessary  to  express  the  idea 
that  animates  us,  remembering  always  that  fidelity 
to  the  conception  is  the  first  obligation  of  art, 
fidelity  to  nature  a  secondary  matter,  and  some 
times  counter-indicated  by  the  primary  law,  and 
out  of  the  question. 

These  considerations  only  add,  however,  to  the 
gravity  of  the  question  I  have  already  asked  and 
which  no  individual  can  answer,  but  a  race  and 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  223 

an  epoch — Does  the  world  want  art  any  longer? 
Has  it,  in  the  present  state  of  human  progress, 
any  place  which  will  justify  the  devotion  to  it  of 
the  class  of  minds  which  once  found  in  it  the 
enthusiasm  of  their  youth  and  the  content  of 
their  ripe  years  ?  Is  it  with  the  race,  as  with  the 
individual,  that — 

"There  was  a  time  when  meadow,  grove,  and  stream, 
The  earth,  and  every  common  sight, 

To  me  did  seem 
Apparelled  in  celestial  light, 
The  glory  and  the  freshness  of  a  dream. 
It  is  not  as  it  has  been  of  yore ; 
Turn  whereso'er  I  may, 

By  night  or  day, 
The  things  which  I  have  seen  I  now  can  see  no  more"? 

and  must  we  be  content,  like  the  apostle  of  na 
ture,  the  passion  and  exaltation  of  the  youth  of 
humanity  being  outgrown,  to  look  back  at  what 
the  bloom-time  has  left  us,  and — 

" .  .  .  .  rather  find 
Strength  in  what  remains  behind, 
In  the  primal  sympathy 
Which  having  been  must  ever  be : 
In  the  soothing  thoughts  that  spring 
Out  of  human  suffering ; 
In  the  faith  that  looks  through  death, 
In  years  that  bring  the  philosophic  mind"? 

Is  not  this  unquestionable  indication  of  the 
operation  of  the  law  of  collective  evolution  on 
the  progress  of  the  race  an  indication  also  of  the 
futility  of  our  schemes  for  collective  art  educa 
tion?  Is  it  not  the  case  that  the  feeling  which 
alone  can  make  fruitful  all  these  schemes  now 


224  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

only  occurs  in  rare  individuals  who  may  be  con 
sidered  survivals  of  a  prior  and  more  youthful 
state  of  humanity,  which  is  now  in  the  "years 
that  bring  the  philosophic  mind"?  No  one  can 
admit  that  the  human  intellect  is  weaker  than  it 
was  five  or  twenty  centuries  ago;  but  it  is  cer 
tain  that  if  we  take  the  pains  to  study  what  was 
done  five  centuries  ago  in  painting,  or  twenty 
centuries  ago  in  sculpture,  and  compare  it  with 
the  best  work  of  to-day,  we  shall  find  the  latter 
trivial  and  'prentice  work  compared  with  the 
ordinary  work  of  men  whose  names  are  lost  in 
the  lustre  of  a  school. 

Then,  little  men  inspired  by  the  Zeitgeist,  painted 
greatly;  now,  our  great  men  fail  to  reach  the 
technical  achievement  of  the  little  men  of  them. 
There  is  only  one  living  painter  who  can  treat  a 
portrait  as  a  Venetian  painter  of  1550  A.D.  would 
have  done  it,  and  how  differently  in  the  mastery 
of  his  material!  If  we  go  to  the  work  of  wider 
range,  the  Campo  Santo  of  Pisa,  the  Stanze,  the 
Sistine  Chapel,  the  distance  becomes  an  abyss ;  the 
simplest  fragment  of  a  Greek  statue  of  450  B.C. 
shows  us  that  the  best  sculpture  of  this  century, 
even  the  French,  is  only  a  happy  child-work,  not 
even  to  be  put  in  sight  of  Donatello  or  Michael 
Angelo.  The  reason  is  simple,  and  already  in 
dicated.  The  early  men  grew  up  in  a  system  in 
which  the  power  of  expression  was  taught  from 
childhood;  they  acquired  method  as  the  musician 
does  now,  and  the  tendency  of  the  opinion  of  their 
time  was  to  keep  them  in  the  good  method. 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  225 

Beginning  as  apprentices,  they  grew  to  be  masters  ; 
art  was  not  a  diversion,  but  a  serious  occupation, 
to  which  fathers  sent  their  sons  when  boys  as  to 
other  trades,  and  they  learned  to  express  ideas 
as  soon  as  ideas  began  to  form,  and  before  they 
had  acquired  scientific  perception ;  and,  having  ac 
quired  the  power  to  express  thought,  power  grew 
as  the  thought  enlarged.  We  begin  late  as  amat 
eurs;  we  see  surfaces,  and  contemporary  taste 
likes  surfaces,  but  nothing  serious;  we  lean  on 
the  model,  and  cannot  escape  it  because  we  dare 
not  risk  to  be  caught  out  of  drawing ;  the  concep 
tion  is  never  clear  because  we  never  trust  it,  and 
we  must  compare  our  work,  touch  by  touch,  with 
the  model;  we  are  never  free,  and  we  end  in 
pose  plastique,  the  caricature  of  art.  The  purely 
mechanical  habit  of  reproducing  the  thing  set 
before  us,  deferring  to  scientific  exactitude  as  if 
it  were  authority  in  art,  has  little  by  little  ex 
tinguished  in  the  modern  mind  the  sense  of  the 
ideal,  just  as  an  absorption  in  the  material  life 
in  its  insatiable  and  ever-increasing  claims,  stifles, 
and  finally  entirely  eliminates,  the  spiritual  facul 
ties.  If  there  be  no  vital  relation  between  the 
two,  there  is,  at  least,  an  analogy.  I  shall  not 
discuss  the  question  whether  religion  —  by  which 
I  mean  the  spiritual  life,  not  a  creed  or  a  church 
— is  necessary  to  human  progress  or  happiness, 
any  more  than  I  should  maintain  that  art,  in  its 
highest  acceptation,  is  so;  indeed,  I  have  honest 
doubts  whether  art  is  necessary  or  greatly  use 
ful;  but  I  have  the  clearest  perception  of  the 

p 


226  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

truth  that,  in  the  one  case  as  in  the  other,  the 
devotion  to  the  material  stifles  the  ideal.  The 
natural  sciences,  the  model,  Fact — which  is  acci 
dent,  fidelity  to  nature,  to  use  the  common  term 
— is  the  negation  of  the  ideal  and  the  extinction 
of  the  perception  of  the  beautiful,  which  are  in 
turn  the  highest  witnesses  of  the  spiritual  life. 
Few  men  love  nature  more  than  I  do,  and  few 
have  spent  time  in  more  patient  and  reverential 
record  of  her  material  features  by  the  most 
scrupulous  copying  of  landscape;  but  I  recognise 
that  if  I  had  ever  possessed  the  higher  gifts  of 
the  artist,  this  devotion  to  the  shell  of  nature 
was  the  most  efficient  method  for  their  ex 
tinction. 

I  know  nothing  more  melancholy  to  one  who 
has  gone  through  the  university  of  art,  the  silent 
schools  of  the  long-past  centuries — Greece,  Tuscany, 
Venice,  Holland  of  the  Van  Eycks,  and  Germany 
of  Diirer  —  than  to  walk  through  a  modern  art 
exhibition  and  hear  the  comments  of  a  public 
which,  if  not  wise,  is  the  only  one  art  has  to  look 
to ;  the  enthusiasm  for  the  superficialities  and  un 
intelligent  reproduction  of  a  world  of  accidents, 
spending  its  admiration  on  tricks  of  the  brush 
and  curiosities  of  texture,  while  the  genuine  ex 
pressions  of  artistic  feeling,  rari  nantes  in  gurgite 
vasto,  soon  to  be  forgotten  as  well,  are  passed 
with  a  joke  or  a  sneer  of  incomprehension  as 
affectations  or  absurd  archaisms ;  or,  what  is 
almost  as  fatal  in  education  in  art,  respected  not 
because  they  are  the  result  of  the  real  art  motive, 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  227 

but  on  account  of  some  incidental  characteristic 
of  the  artist,  an  eccentricity  which  is  attributed 
to  a  peculiarity  of  vision,  or  the  discovery  of  a 
new  process  of  painting.  But  this  is  the  con 
dition  of  public  appreciation,  not  only  in  Eng 
land  and  America,  but  even  in  France,  where 
the  national  temperament  is  more  favourable  to 
the  development  of  aesthetic  feeling. 

As  I  have  said,  no  individual  can  answer  the 
question  I  have  asked — Do  we  want  art  any 
longer?  But  if  I  were  called  on  to  answer  my 
own  question,  I  would  say,  No!  We  want  por 
traiture,  because  the  leading  motive  in  the 
majority  is  vanity,  and  the  highest  virtue 
domestic  affection.  For  the  awakening  of  the 
highest  artistic  faculties  we  have  neither  the 
desire  nor  the  ability.  We  understand  vaguely 
what  is  like  nature,  and  we  confound  the  repre 
sentation  of  nature  with  art.  People  who  take 
to  art  in  the  feeling  that  it  is  a  better  amuse 
ment  than  any  other,  are  too  far  advanced  in 
life  to  acquire  a  really  noble  execution,  just  as 
they  would  be  in  music;  and  they  always  depend 
on  nature  because  it  is  the  easiest  way  to  get 
along.  The  establishment  of  schools  in  the  old 
and  true  sense  of  the  word,  where  the  training 
should  begin  with  the  development  of  the  in 
tellect,  and  correct  habits  of  working  should  be 
acquired  before  the  critical  faculties  are  at  work, 
in  which  a  regular  apprenticeship  should  be  gone 
through,  the  process  by  which  alone  a  master 
can  be  made,  is,  in  the  present  state  of  things, 


228  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

impossible.  If  in  some  more  or  less  remote 
future  a  reaction  should  follow  the  present 
temper  and  art  find  a  new  world,  we  may  have 
prepared  the  way  for  it  by  the  recognition  of  its 
true  principles,  and,  above  all,  the  clear  under 
standing  that  its  fundamental  law  is  that  in  its 
sphere  art  is  supreme,  and  nature  only  its  bricks 
and  mortar.  So  long  as  we  confound  fidelity  to 
nature  with  excellence  in  art,  we  ignore  that 
law. 

NOTE. — The  following  quotations  from  a  note 
of  Mr  Watts,  which  I  am  permitted  to  make 
public,  written  after  reading  the  foregoing  essay 
in  MS.,  will  certainly  entitle  the  views  which 
they  discuss  to  a  certain  degree  of  consideration, 
and  will  have  an  intrinsic  value  as  the  con 
clusions  of  one  whom  I  am  compelled  to  regard 
as  the  profoundest  thinker  on  art  with  whose 
opinions  I  am  conversant: — 

"I  agree  so  much  with  the  general  tenor  of 
your  article  that  it  is  what  I  am  always  saying. 
There  are  two  or  three  points  I  might  wish  to 
discuss  upon  the  question  of  art  education. 
Certainly  I  do  not  think  modern  art  education  a 
good  one,  but  I  think  education  in  art  necessary. 
The  language  of  art  is  not  quite  a  natural  one, 
since  it  is  not  possessed  by  all.  The  great  artist, 
like  the  great  poet,  may  forget  his  means  as  he 
forgets  himself  in  his  work;  but  to  do  this,  his 
means  must  be  entirely  sufficient.  When  Words 
worth  wrote  the  "  Imitations  of  Immortality,"  he 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  229 

never  had  to  think  of  his  grammar  or  his  spell 
ing:  such  a  necessity  must  have  crippled  his 
utterances.  The  soldier  fighting  for  his  life  does 
not  think  about  the  rules  of  fence,  but  for  the 
perfect  handling  of  his  weapons,  and  he  has  had 
to  learn  to  use  them.  The  greatest  art  must 
deal  with  the  human  figure,  the  strongest  appeal 
to  humanity  can  only  be  made  through  humanity. 
Michael  Angelo  was  not  a  better  artist  for  giving 
twelve  years  to  the  study  of  anatomy,  perhaps 
the  worse;  but  a  very  considerable  knowledge 
of,  and  acquaintance  with,  the  structure  of  the 
human  frame  is  absolutely  necessary,  an  acquaint 
ance  difficult  for  him  to  acquire  in  northern 
climates  and  in  modern  times.  The  artist  ac 
quainted  with  the  human  structure  through  the 
medium  of  his  restricted  observation  alone,  will 
find  himself  in  the  position  of  the  musician  who 
composes  by  ear.  This  may  suffice  for  his  melody, 
but  without  knowledge  of  counterpoint  he  will 
not  be  able  to  set  down  in  writing  the  compli 
cations  of  his  harmony.  Painting  from  the  model 
is  a  thing  I  entirely  disapprove  of:  I  never  do 
it  and  have  never  done  it,  never  setting  up  the 
model  in  a  fixed  position,  though  referring  to  it 
occasionally  when  knowledge  or  memory  may  be 
at  fault;  but  there  should  be  no  hesitation  for 
want  of  knowledge,  and  the  more  elevated  the 
intention  the  more  necessary  that  there  should 
be  no  obvious  violations  of  grammar  in  art. 
Also,  I  think  that  you  should  make  it  under 
stood  that  you  admit  that  even  painting  from  still 


230  THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART 

life  and  subjects  where  dexterous  imitation  and 
beautiful  workmanship  are  interesting  and  pleas 
ing,  is  still  art  in  a  degree  and  worthy  of  praise, 
as  all  things  done  conscientiously  are :  this,  while 
you  rightly  insist  that  reality  is  fatal  to  the 
dignity  of  higher  endeavour.  ...  I  should  not 
like  my  method  of  study  to  be  misunderstood : 
though  not  painting  from  the  model,  I  do  not 
depend  upon  knowledge,  still  less  memory,  alone, 
but,  for  example,  get  any  one  who  may  be  about 
to  lend  me  a  wrist  or  an  elbow,  not  merely  in 
the  position  required  but  turning  the  joint  about, 
not  to  copy  but  to  refresh  my  knowledge.  This 
is  probably  what  Phidias  did  with  greater  oppor 
tunities.  I  do  the  same  thing — that  is  to  say, 
study  more  than  I  have  immediate  occasion  to 
represent  when  painting  a  portrait.  For  example, 
if  I  am  painting  a  full-face,  I  endeavour  to  learn 
the  profile,  that  I  may  not  depend  on  the  light 
and  shadow  alone  for  the  form  of  the  features. 
I  do  not  hesitate  to  repeat  that  I  consider  the 
painting  from  the  model  in  a  set  position  a 
pernicious  practice,  but  the  study  of  nature  is 
another  thing  and  cannot  be  dispensed  with. 
...  I  think  you  may  have  remarked  that  I  pur 
posely  avoid  display  of  anatomical  knowledge 
in  my  figures,  and  all  reference  to  creeds  in  my 
subjects." 

These  views  of  the  great  artist  are  in  no  wise 
in  conflict  with  those  I  have  tried  to  expound, 
though,  as  he  writes  in  the  nature  of  a  general 
approval,  he  dwells  on  the  points  on  which  he 


THE  REVIVAL  OF  ART  231 

desires  to  qualify  my  statements;  but  I  do  not 
exclude  a  lower  form  of  art,  which  I  have  noted 
as  "low,  or  spurious  art,"  and  the  excellence  of 
which  is  in  the  perfection  of  its  means,  not  in 
the  nobility  of  its  ends,  and  to  be  respected  as 
we  should  respect  a  versifier  whose  grammar  and 
diction  were  faultless,  but  who  was  quite  devoid 
of  poetic  inspiration.  Nature  is  noble,  and  the 
most  scrupulous  rendering  of  her,  in  every  at 
tainable  aspect,  is  worthy  commendation  as 
handicraft ;  but  even  here  we  are  in  a  way  which 
leads  to  the  antipodes  of  the  true  and  supreme 
art — that  of  the  ideal,  the  creative.  There  is  one 
honour  of  the  hand  and  another  of  the  brain, 
and  they  rarely  go  to  the  same  work. 


THE   SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

TowAED8  the  close  of  a  dreamy  August  day,  in 
company  with  a  half-dozen  friends,  members  of 
that  circle  of  literary  men  who  made  the  American 
Cambridge  more  eminent  in  American  literary  life 
than  it  has  been  before  or  since,  I  was  watching 
the  waning  of  the  day  in  our  camp  on  the  sheet 
of  water  in  the  Adirondacks  known  as  "Tupper's 
Lake,"  and  mingling  in  a  desultory  conversation, 
ranging  from  rifles  and  the  shape  of  the  bullets 
we  used,  to  spiritualism.  The  camp  was  built  on 
the  bold  shore  of  the  lake,  whose  waters,  the  un- 
tremulous  mirror  of  the  mountains  and  unbroken 
forest  around  and  the  cloudless  sky  above,  showed 
only  in  blue  fragments  through  the  interstices  of 
the  leafy  veil  that  shut  us  in.  The  forest  was  un 
broken  to  the  water's  edge,  and  even  out  over  the 
water  itself  the  firs  and  cedars  stretched  their 
gaunt  limbs,  with  here  and  there  a  moisture-loving 
white  birch,  so  that  from  the  very  shore  one  sees 
only  suggestive  bits  of  sky  and  distance;  while 
from  where  we  were  lying,  sky,  hills,  and  water 
were  all  blue  alike,  and  undistinguishable  alike, 
glimpses  of  a  world  of  sunshine  which  the  cool 
and  grateful  shadow  we  lay  in  made  more  delicious 
to  the  thought.  We  were  sheltered  in  right 
woodsman's  style;  our  little  house  of  fresh-peeled 

232 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  233 

bark  of  spruces,  twelve  feet  by  nine,  open  only  to 
the  east,  towards  the  lake,  protected  us  from  wind 
and  rain,  and  the  primeval  forest  shut  round  us 
so  closely  that  no  eyes  could  pierce  a  pistol  shot 
into  their  green  recesses.  There  were  blue-jays 
about  us,  making  the  woods  ring  with  their 
querulous  cries,  and  a  single  osprey  could  be 
heard  circling  and  screaming  above  the  water  as 
he  sailed,  watching  for  a  supper  in  the  lake. 

Three  of  the  party  were  asleep;  the  others, 
amongst  whom  was  Lowell,  talked  desultorily, 
quietly  and  low,  as  if  the  drowsiness  had  half 
conquered  them  too.  The  conversation  had  turned 
to  spiritualism,  through  my  narrating  some 
singular  experiences  I  had  met  with  in  the  way 
of  presentiments  and  second-sight  during  a  three 
months'  sojourn  in  the  woods  the  summer  before. 
There  is  something  wonderfully  exciting  to  the 
imagination  in  the  wilderness,  after  the  first  im 
pression  of  monotony  and  lonesomeness  has  gone, 
and  there  comes  the  necessity  to  animate  this  so 
vacant  world  with  something ;  to  people  it  if  even 
with  shadows.  And  so  the  pines  lift  themselves 
grimly  against  the  twilight  sky,  and  the  meanings 
of  the  woods  become  full  of  meaning  and  mystery. 
Living,  therefore,  as  I  had  done  in  the  wilderness, 
summer  after  summer,  until  there  is  no  place  in 
the  world  so  much  like  a  home  to  me  as  a  bark 
"camp"  in  the  Adirondack,  I  had  come  to  be 
what  most  people  would  call  morbid,  but  what  I 
felt  to  be  simply  sensitive  to  the  things  around, 
which  we  never  see,  but  to  which  we  at  times 


234  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

pay  the  deference  of  a  tremor  of  inexplicable 
fear,  a  quicker  and  less  deeply-drawn  breath,  an 
involuntary  turning  of  the  head  to  see  some 
thing  which  we  know  we  shall  not  see  and  are 
glad  that  we  do  not,  all  which  things  we  laugh 
at  as  childish  when  they  have  passed,  yet  tremble 
at  as  readily  when  they  come  again. 

Lowell,  in  spite  of  the  poet  in  him,  had  a  strong 
vein  of  metaphysic,  and  looked  at  those  matters 
with  a  cold  analysis;  and  yet  his  imagination  at 
times  was  so  active  that  his  images  worked  out 
their  own  solutions,  while  he  looked  on,  and  he 
had  wonders  to  tell  of,  passing  mine  by  a  degree ; 
his  experiences  were  more  remarkable  than  mine, 
and  yet  he  had  an  explanation  for  everything 
which  I  could  not  put  aside,  though  not  always 
convinced.  "  Yes,"  said  he,  as  he  rose  and  knocked 
the  ashes  out  of  his  meerschaum  to  join  in  the  row 
the  doctor  suggested  to  watch  the  sunset  from  the 
lake,  "  yes,  I  believe  in  your  kind  of  spiritual  world, 
but  that  it  is  purely  subjective."  I  was  silenced 
in  a  moment.  This  single  sentence,  spoken  like 
the  conviction  of  a  lifetime,  produced  an  effect 
his  logic  had  not.  He  had  opened  to  me  a  new 
world  of  marvels  and  mysteries ;  he  had  not  con 
vinced  me  that  I  was  wrong  in  my  own  theories, 
so  much  as  opened  to  suggestion  new  paths  of 
explanation,  and  had  turned  the  spiritual  world 
into  myself.  The  phase  of  spiritual  existence 
which  had  been  real  to  me  melted  away  into  the 
thinness  of  an  incompleted  dream ;  but  as  it 
melted,  it  revealed  a  real  world  beyond,  which  I 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  235 

had  not  dreamed  of  before,  or  at  least  had  never 
realised  in  the  true  sense  of  the  term.  Still, 
amongst  phantoms,  the  subjective  world  flamed 
out  on  me  as  the  world  beyond  all  things.  I  had 
played  with  the  words  and  phrases  relating  to 
Subjectivity  and  Objectivity,  and  understood  them 
as  terms  of  logic,  but  now  their  rca/lily  suddenly 
flashed  on  me,  seen  in  the  round.  I  looked  through 
the  range  of  human  cognitions,  and  found  from 
beginning  to  end  only  the  proclamation  of  the 
presence  of  the  arch  -  magician,  Imagination.  I 
had  often  said  to  myself :  "  The  universe  is  sub 
jective  to  Deity,  objective  to  me ;  but  if  I  am 
in  His  image,  what  is  that  in  me  which  corre 
sponds  to  the  Creator  in  Him?"  Here  I  found 
myself  at  last,  the  creator  of  a  universe  of  un- 
substantialities  all  of  the  stuff  that  dreams  are 
made  of,  and  all  alike  unconsciously  evoked, 
whether  the  dreams  of  sleep  or  the  hauntings  of 
waking  hours.  I  grew  bewildered  as  the  realisa 
tion  of  the  thought,  not  merely  its  intellectual 
perception,  loomed  up  in  its  infinite  significance ; 
and  a  thousand  facts  and  phenomena,  which  had 
been  standing  around  my  little  circle  of  vision, 
burst  into  light  and  recognition,  as  though  they 
had  been  waiting  beyond  the  verge  for  the  magic 
words.  Lowell  had  spoken  them. 

Silent,  almost  for  the  moment  unconscious  of 
external  things,  I  walked  down  to  the  shore. 
Taking  our  seats  in  one  of  the  boats,  we  pushed 
off  on  the  quiet  water.  There  was  no  flaw  in 
the  mirror  which  gave  us  a  duplicated  world. 


236  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

Line  for  line,  tint  for  tint,  the  noble  mountain 
that  lifted  itself  at  the  east,  robed  in  primeval 
forest  to  its  very  summit,  and  then  suffused  with 
the  rosy  light  of  the  setting  sun,  sunk  behind  the 
ridge  behind  us,  was  reproduced  in  the  void  below. 
Tlic^shadows  of  the  western  upland  began  to  climb 
the  opposite  Huffs  of  the  lake  shore.  We  pulled 
well  out  into  the  iat?  and  lay  on  our  oars.  If  any 
thing  was  said  I  do  not  remember  it.  I  was  as 
one  who  had  just  heard  words  from  the  dead,  and 
hears  as  prattle  all  the  sounds  of  common  life. 
My  eyes,  my  ears,  were  opened  anew  to  nature, 
and  it  seemed  as  if  a  new  sense  had  been  given 
me.  I  felt  as  I  had  never  felt  before,  the  cold 
gloom  of  the  shadow  creep  up,  ridge  after  ridge, 
towards  the  solitary  peak,  irresistibly  and  trium 
phantly  encroaching  on  the  light  which  fought 
back  towards  the  summit,  where  it  must  yield  at 
last.  It  drew  back  over  ravines  and  gorges,  over 
the  unbroken  wildernesses  of  firs  which  covered 
all  the  upper  portion  of  the  mountain,  deepening 
its  rose  tint,  and  gaining  in  intensity  what  it  lost 
in  expanse,  diminished  to  a  hand-breadth,  to  a 
point,  and,  flickering  an  instant,  went  out,  leaving 
in  the  whole  range  of  vision  no  speck  of  sunlight 
to  relieve  the  immensity  of  gloomy  shadow.  I 
had  come  under  a  spell;  for,  often  as  I  had  seen 
the  sunset  in  these  mountains  and  over  the  lakes, 
I  had  never  before  felt  as  I  now  felt — that  I  was 
a  part  of  the  landscape,  and  that  it  was  to  me 
something  more  than  rocks  and  trees.  The  sun 
light  had  died  on  it.  Holmes  took  up  the  oars, 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  237 

and  our  silently  -  moving  boat  broke  the  glassy 
surface  again.  All  around  us  no  distinction  was 
visible  between  the  landscape  above  and  that 
below,  no  water-line  could  be  found ;  and  to  the 
west,  where  the  sky  was  still  glowing  and  golden, 
with  faint  bands  of  crimson  cirrus  flaming  along 
across  the  deep  and  tremulous  blue,  growing  violet 
as  the  sun  sank  lower,  we  could  distinguish 
nothing  in  the  landscape  but  vague  and  vacil 
lating  waves  of  retreating  forest.  Neither  sound 
nor  motion  of  animate  or  inanimate  thing  dis 
turbed  the  scene,  save  that  of  the  oars,  with  the 
long  lines  of  blue  which  ran  off  from  the  wake 
of  the  boat  into  the  mystery  closing  behind  us. 
A  rifle-shot  rang  out  from  the  landing  and  rolled 
in  multitudinous  echoes  around  the  lake,  dying 
away  in  faintest  thunders  and  murmurs  from  the 
ravines  which  harrowed  the  mountain-sides.  It 
was  the  call  to  supper,  and  we  pulled  back  to  the 
light  of  the  camp-fire  which  was  now  glimmering 
through  the  trees  which  shut  in  our  camp. 

Supper  over,  the  smokers  lighted  their  pipes, 
and  a  rambling  conversation  began  on  the  sights 
and  sounds  of  the  day.  For  my  part,  unable  to 
quiet  the  uneasy  questioning  which  possessed  me, 
or  to  take  part  in  a  conversation  which  had  no 
meaning  for  me  in  my  mood,  I  wandered  down 
to  the  shore,  and,  entering  my  boat,  pushed  idly 
out  into  the  lake  to  be  alone.  The  uneasy  ques 
tion  still  stirred  within  me;  and  now,  looking 
towards  the  north-west,  where  the  sky  still  glowed 
faintly  with  the  failing  twilight,  a  long  line  of 


238  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

pines,  gaunt  and  humanesque  as  no  other  tree 
but  our  North- American  white  pine  is,  was  relieved 
in  massy  blackness  against  the  golden  grey,  like 
a  procession  of  giants.  They  were  mostly  in 
groups  of  two  or  three,  with  now  and  then  an 
isolated  one,  stretching  along  the  horizon,  losing 
themselves  in  the  gloom  of  the  northern  moun 
tains.  The  weirdness  of  the  scene  caught  my 
excited  imagination  in  an  instant,  and  I  became 
conscious  of  two  mental  phenomena.  The  first 
was  an  impression  of  motion  in  the  trees,  as  if 
they  were  marching  eastward,  which,  whimsical 
as  it  was,  I  had  not  the  power  to  dispel.  I 
trembled  from  head  to  foot  under  the  conscious 
ness  of  this  supernatural  vitality.  My  rational 
faculties  were  as  clear  as  ever  they  had  been, 
and  I  understood  perfectly  that  the  semblance 
of  motion,  delusive  as  it  was,  was  owing  to  two 
characteristics  of  the  pine — viz.,  that  it  follows  the 
shores  of  the  lakes  in  long  lines,  rarely  growing 
at  a  distance  from  the  water,  except  when  it 
follows,  in  the  same  orderly  arrangement,  the 
rocky  ridges;  and  that,  from  its  height  above  all 
the  other  forest  trees,  it  catches  the  full  force  of 
the  prevalent  westerly  winds,  and  grows,  slightly 
leaning  to  the  east,  like  a  person  walking.  These 
traits  of  the  trees  explained  entirely  the  pheno 
menon;  yet  the  knowledge  of  them  had  not  the 
least  effect  on  my  imagination,  which  remained 
deluded.  I  was  awestruck,  as  though  the  phan 
toms  of  some  antedeluvian  race  had  risen  from 
the  Adirondack  valleys,  and  were  marching  in 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  239 

silence  to  their  old  fanes  on  the  mountain-tops. 
I  cowered  in  the  boat  under  an  absolute  nervous 
chill  of  apprehension. 

The  second  phenomenon  was  that  I  heard  a  voice 
which  said  distinctly  these  words,  "  The  procession 
of  the  Anakim ! "  and,  at  the  same  moment,  I 
became  conscious  of  some  disembodied  spiritual 
being  standing  near  me,  as  we  sometimes  are 
aware  of  the  presence  of  a  friend  without  having 
seen  him.  Everybody  accustomed  to  solitary 
thought  has  probably  recognised  this  form  of 
mental  action,  and  speculated  on  the  strange 
duality  of  our  natures  implied  in  it.  The  spirit 
ualists  call  it  "  impressional  communication,"  and 
abandon  themselves  to  its  vagaries  in  the  belief 
that  it  is  the  speech  of  angels ;  thinking  men  find 
in  it  a  mystery  of  our  mental  organisation,  and 
avail  themselves  of  it  under  the  direction  of  their 
reason.  I  at  present  speculated  with  the  philos 
ophers;  but  my  imagination,  stronger  than  my 
reason,  refused  the  explanation,  and  assured  me 
that  something  spoke.  I  sat  still  as  long  as, 
alone,  I  could  keep  down  the  spectral  horror  that 
grew  on  me,  and,  paddling  back  to  the  landing,  I 
took  refuge  in  the  camp,  feeling  only  reassured  in 
the  presence  of  my  companions. 

But  even  then  my  attendant  DaBmon  did  not 
leave  me,  for  now  I  heard  the  question,  asked  in 
a  taunting  tone,  "Subjective  or  objective?" 

I  asked  myself  in  reply:  "Am  I  sane  or 
mad?" 

"Quite    sane,    but    with    your    eyes    opened    to 


240  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

something  new!"  was  the  reply,  as  instantaneous 
as  thought. 

On  such  occasions  as  ours,  men  get  back  easily 
to  the  primitive  usage  and  conditions  of  humanity. 
We  had  arisen  at  dawn;  darkness  brought  the 
desire  to  rest.  Our  beds  were  made  of  the  boughs 
of  the  fir-trees,  spread  over  the  flooring  of  the 
"shanty,"  with  a  trimming  of  the  twigs  of  the 
fragrant  Arbor  Vitce,  on  which  we  spread  our 
selves,  side  by  side,  with  our  feet  to  a  huge 
camp-fire,  and  all  except  myself  were  soon  asleep. 
I  lay  long,  excited,  watching  the  occasional  gleam 
of  a  star  through  the  boughs  overhead,  and  find 
ing  in  their  twinkling  further  sign  of  my  fellow 
ship  with  nature,  my  new  state  of  existence,  and 
they  seemed  to  be  winking  to  me  as  to  one  who 
shared  the  secret  of  their  existence.  The  moan 
ing  of  the  tall  pine  trees  overhead  had  a  new 
sound  and  significance,  which  it  seemed  as  if  I 
must  come  to  understand  —  everything  was  new 
and  strange  —  nature  and  I  had  everything  in 
common.  I  slept  at  length  —  a  strange  kind  of 
sleep;  for  when  the  guides  awoke  me  in  broad 
daylight,  I  was  conscious  of  a  feeling  as  if  some 
one  had  been  talking  with  me  all  night. 

In  broad  day,  with  my  companions,  and  in 
motion,  the  terror  passed,  and  the  influences  of 
the  previous  evening  seemed  to  keep  a  distance; 
but  I  was  aware  that  they  were  in  waiting  for 
the  moment  when  I  should  be  alone  again.  The 
day  was  as  brilliant,  as  tranquil  as  its  predecessor, 
and  the  council  decided  that  it  should  be  devoted 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  241 

to  a  deer  drive,  for  we  had  eaten  the  last 
of  our  venison  at  breakfast.  The  members  of 
the  company  were  assigned  their  places  at  the 
points  where  the  deer  was  most  likely  to  pass 
to  take  the  water,  while,  with  my  guide,  Steve 
Martin,  I  went  up  Bog  River  to  start  him,  The 
river — a  dark,  sluggish  stream,  about  fifty  feet 
wide — is  the  outlet  of  a  chain  of  lakes  above,  and 
is  a  favourite  feeding-ground  for  the  deer  who 
come  for  the  leaves  of  the  Nuphar  Lutea  which 
partly  fill  the  stream.  We  surprised  one,  and 
giving  him  a  shot  as  he  went  out,  I  wounded 
him,  but  not  seriously  enough  to  stop  his  running, 
and  landing,  we  put  the  dog  on  his  track  and 
went  back  to  wait.  The  deer  ran  back  into  the 
hills,  and  we  could  only  follow  his  motions  by 
the  occasional  baying  of  the  hound.  It  came 
and  went,  circling  round,  and  the  old  habit  of 
the  hunter  came  to  fill  my  mind  and  chase  away 
the  pre-occupations  of  the  night.  The  purely 
animal  excitement  of  the  chase  is,  perhaps,  the 
best  remedy  for  an  over-strained  mind,  and  I 
was  for  the  moment  a  beast  of  prey.  As  the 
deer,  after  twice  doubling,  had  taken  the  direc 
tion  of  the  lake,  we  felt  sure  that  he  would  take 
the  water  there,  and  we  slowly  paddled  down 
stream.  The  emotions  of  the  hunt  had,  as  I 
thought,  brought  me  back  to  a  natural  state  of 
mind;  and  as  I  lay  in  the  stern  of  the  boat, 
looking  up  at  the  blue  sky,  steeping  in  the 
healthy  sunlight  which  penetrated  soul  and 
body,  and  the  brain  lulled  into  lethargy  by  the 

Q 


242  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

unbroken  silence  and  monotony  of  the  scene,  I 
looked  back  to  the  experience  of  the  night  before 
as  a  curious  dream.  I  asked  myself  wherein  it 
differed  from  a  dream,  and  instantly  my  Daemon 
replied,  "In  nowise."  The  instant  reply  startled 
me,  but  the  sunshine  had  dispelled  the  terror, 
and  I  asked,  as  a  matter  of  course,  "But  if  no 
more  than  a  dream,  it  amounts  to  nothing."  It 
answered  me,  "But  when  a  man  dreams  wide 
awake  ?  "  I  pondered  and  hesitated  in  my  thought, 
and  it  went  on,  "And  how  do  you  know  that 
dreams  are  nothing?  They  are  as  real,  while 
they  last,  as  your  waking  thoughts;  your  dream- 
life  imposes  on  your  consciousness  with  the  im 
pression  of  its  reality — your  waking-life  does  no 
more ;  you  wake  to  one  and  sleep  to  the  other. 
Which  is  the  real  and  which  the  false,  since  you 
assume  that  one  is  false  ?  "  I  could  only  ask 
myself  again  the  eternal  question,  "  Objective  or 
subjective?"  and  the  Daemon  made  no  further 
suggestion.  At  this  instant  we  heard  the  report 
of  a  gun  from  the  lake,  and  Steve  said,  "The 
deer  is  in — that's  the  doctor's  shot-gun."  And  we 
knew  that  the  deer  was  killed,  as  the  doctor 
had  a  double-barrelled  shot-gun,  and  if  he  had 
missed  with  the  first  shot  would  have  fired  the 
second,  and  we  pulled  back  to  camp. 

Arriving  at  the  landing,  we  found  the  guides 
dressing  the  deer  and  the  company  preparing 
for  dinner.  The  rest  of  the  day  passed  in  fishing, 
in  exploring  the  nooks  and  islands  of  the  lake, 
and  my  usual  frame  of  mind  returned.  As  the 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  243 

night  came  on,  the  excitement  of  the  evening 
before  returned,  and  I  determined  to  stay  in 
camp  through  the  evening;  not  that  I  feared 
the  ghostly  society  which  had  haunted  me  out 
on  the  lake,  for  with  the  experience  it  had 
become  familiar,  but  I  wanted  to  see  if  the 
mental  action  was  produced  by  solitude,  or  if  it 
would  come  in  society.  The  company  went  in 
part  out  for  a  row,  and  part  sat  down  to  cards 
by  candle  light  and  the  huge  fire  of  green  logs. 
I  retired  to  the  shanty  and  threw  myself  down 
on  my  blankets ;  but  then  I  felt  the  Dasmon 
sitting  by  me,  ready  to  be  questioned. 

Then  came  suddenly  a  flash  of  doubt  as  to  the 
theological  status  of  my  ghostly  vis-a-vis,  and  I 
abruptly  asked,  "Who  are  you?"  "Nobody," 
replied  the  Daemon,  oracularly. 

This  I  knew  in  one  sense  to  be  true,  and  I 
replied,  "But  you  know  what  I  mean.  Don't 
trifle.  Of  what  nature  is  your  personality?" 

"Do  you  think,"  it  replied,  "that  personality 
is  necessary  to  existence?  We  are  spirit." 

"  But  wherein,  save  in  the  having  or  not  having 
a  body,  do  you  differ  from  me?" 

"In  all  the  consequences  of  that  difference." 

"Very  well,  go  on." 

"Do  you  not  see  that  without  your  circum 
stances  you  are  only  half  a  being?  that  you  are 
shaped  by  the  action  and  reaction  between  your 
own  mind  and  surrounding  things,  and  that  your 
mind  is  only  the  medium  of  this  action  and 
reaction?  Do  you  not  see  that  without  this 


244  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

there  would  have  been  no  consciousness  of  self, 
and  consequently  neither  individuality  nor  person 
ality?  Remove  those  circumstances  by  removing 
the  body,  and  do  you  not  remove  personality?" 

"But,"  said  I,  "you  certainly  have  individuality, 
and  wherein  does  that  differ  from  personality?" 

"  Possibly  you  commit  two  mistakes,"  replied 
the  Daemon.  "As  to  the  distinction,  it  is  one 
with  a  difference.  You  are  personal  to  yourself, 
individual  to  others;  and  we,  though  individual 
to  you,  may  still  be  impersonal.  If  spirit  takes 
form  from  having  something  to  act  on,  the  fact 
that  we  act  on  you  is  sufficient,  so  far  as  you  are 
concerned,  to  develop  individuality." 

I  hesitated,  puzzled. 

It  went  on :  "  Don't  you  see  that  the  inertia 
of  spirit  is  motion,  as  that  of  matter  is  rest? 
Now,  compare  this  universal  spirit  to  a  river 
flowing  always  but  tranquilly,  and  which  in  itself 
gives  no  evidence  of  motion,  save  where  it  meets 
with  some  inert  point  of  resistance.  This  point 
of  resistance  has  the  effect  of  action  in  itself, 
and  you  attribute  to  it  all  the  eddies  and  ripples 
produced.  You  must  see  that  your  own  immo 
bility  is  the  cause  of  the  phenomena  of  life  which 
give  you  your  own  apparent  existence;  our  in 
dividuality  to  you  may  be  just  as  much  the  effect 
of  your  own  personality ;  you  find  us  responsive 
only  to  your  own  mental  state." 

I  was  conscious  of  a  sophistry  somewhere,  but 
could  not  for  the  life  of  me  detect  it.  I  thought 
of  the  Tempter ;  I  almost  feared  to  listen  to 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  245 

another  word ;  but  the  Daemon  seemed  so  fair, 
so  rational,  responding  only  to  my  questions,  and 
above  all  so  confident  of  truth,  that  I  could  not 
entertain  my  fears. 

"  But,"  said  I  finally,  "  if  my  personality  is  owing 
to  my  physical  circumstances,  to  my  body  and  its 
inertise,  what  is  the  body  itself  owing  to?" 

"All  physical  or  organic  existence  is  owing  to 
the  antagonism  between  particles  of  matter, 
fixed  and  resistant,  and  the  all-pervading,  ever- 
flowing  spirit,  the  different  inertiae  conflict;  and 
end  by  combining  in  an  organic  being,  since 
neither  can  be  annihilated  or  transmuted.  Per 
haps  we  may  tell  you  after  a  time  how  this 
antagonism  commences;  at  present  you  would 
hardly  be  able  to  comprehend  it  clearly." 

This  I  felt,  for  I  was  already  getting  confused 
with  the  questions  that  suggested  themselves  to 
me  as  to  the  relations  between  spirit  and  matter. 
I  asked  once  more,  "  Have  you  never  been 
personal,  as  I  am,  for  instance  ?  Have  you  not 
at  some  time  had  a  body  and  a  name?" 

"Perhaps,"  was  the  reply;  "but  it  was  so  long 
ago,  and  the  trifling  circumstances  you  call  living, 
with  all  their  direct  and  recognisable  effects, 
pass  away  so  soon,  that  it  is  impossible  to  recall 
anything  of  it.  There  seems  a  kind  of  conscious 
ness  when  we  have  something  to  act  against,  as 
against  your  mind  at  the  present  moment;  but 
as  to  name,  and  all  unsubstantial  distinctive- 
ness,  what  is  the  use  of  them  where  there  is  no 
possibility  of  confusion  or  mistake  as  regards  an 


246  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

identity  which  has  not  the  most  trivial  import 
ance?  We  have  said  that  we  are  spirit;  and 
when  we  say  that  matter  is  one  and  spirit  one, 
we  have  gone  behind  individual  identity." 

"But,"  asked  I,  "am  I  to  lose  my  individual 
existence,  to  become  finally  merged  in  a  uni 
versal  impersonality?  What,  then,  is  the  object 
of  life?" 

"  You  see  the  plants  and  animals  all  around 
you  growing  up  and  passing  away — each  entering 
its  little  orbit,  and  sweeping  through  this  sphere 
of  cognisance  back  again  to  the  same  mystery 
that  it  emerged  from ;  you  never  ask  the  question 
as  to  them,  but  for  yourself  you  are  anxious. 
If  you  had  not  been,  would  creation  have  been 
the  less  creation?  If  you  cease,  will  it  not  still 
be  as  great?  Truly,  though,  your  mistake  is  one 
of  too  little,  not  of  too  much.  You  assume  that 
the  animals  will  be  annihilated;  but,  in  fact, 
nothing  dies.  The  very  crystals  into  which  the 
so-called  primitive  substances  are  formed,  and 
which  are  the  first  forms  of  organisation,  have  a 
spirit  in  them.  If  you  could  decompose  the 
crystal,  would  you  annihilate  what  made  it  such? 
The  plant  decomposes  and  absorbs  the  crystal, 
and  it  becomes  a  part  of  a  higher,  or  more 
complex  organisation,  equally  dependent  on  the 
originating  motive;  and,  if  it  is  cut  down  and 
cast  into  the  oven,  is  the  organic  element  food 
for  the  flames.  You,  the  animal,  do  but  exist 
through  the  absorption  of  these  vegetable  and 
derived  substances,  and  why  should  you  claim 


247 

exemption  from  the  analogical  law  of  absorption 
and    aggregation?     You    killed    a    deer    to-day — 
the    flesh    you    will    appropriate    to    supply    the 
wants   of    your    own    material   organisation;   but 
the  life,  the  spirit  which  made   that  flesh  a  deer, 
in    obedience    to    which    that    shell    of    external 
appearance    is    moulded — you    missed    that.     You 
can    trace    the   body  in   its   metamorphoses ;  but 
for  this  impalpable,  active,  and  only  real  part  of 
the  being,  it  were  folly  to  assume  that  it  is  more 
perishable,  more  evanescent  than  the  matter  of 
which  it  was  the  master.    And  why  should  not 
you,  as  well  as  the  deer,  go  back  into  the  Great 
Life  from  which  you  came  ?    As  to  the  purpose 
in  creation,  why  should  there  be  any  other  than 
that  which  existence  always  shows,  of  creation?" 
I  was  silent,  pondering  as  to  how  I  should  form 
my  questions  on  a  subject  which  seemed  to  me 
that    of    Hamlet,    to    be    or    not   to   be,   and   the 
Daemon,  as  if  following  my  thought,  said:    "Do 
not    understand    that  we  affirm  or  the  contrary 
as  to  what  you  consider  the  indispensable  form 
of  being— we  only  seek  to  put  your  own  ideas  on 
the  subject  on  the  true  path ;  we  cannot  help  you 
to  more  truth  than  you  have  fitted  your  mind  to 
assimilate.     You  puzzle  yourself  uselessly  on  the 
finer  distinctions  which  must  be  drawn  to  make 
the    distinction   between  matter  and  spirit  clear. 
Your  ideas  are  stereotyped  in  certain  forms,  and 
that  which  does  not  find  its  type  amongst  those 
you  know  is  not  recognisable  by  you.     Is  there 
any  distinction  which  you  can  recognise  between 


248  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

you  and  the  deer  you  killed  to-day,  which  justifies 
you  in  assuming  a  right  to  immortality  and  future 
individuality  that  the  deer  had  not?  Are  you 
who  daily  violate  the  laws  of  your  spiritual 
existence  more  worthy  than  he  who  never  vio 
lated  one?" 

I  had  been  slowly  coming  to  the  perception  of 
the  fact  that  all  the  leading  ideas  of  the  Daemon 
were  put  in  the  form  of  questions,  as  if  from  a 
cautious  non-committalism,  or  as  if  it  dared  not 
in  plain  words  affirm  that  they  were  the  absolute 
truth.  I  felt  that  there  was  another  side  to  the 
matter,  and  was  confident  that  I  should  sooner 
or  later  detect  the  sophistry  of  my  Daemon;  but 
then  I  did  not  feel  competent  to  carry  the  subject 
further,  and  was  sensible  of  a  readiness  on  the 
part  of  my  interlocutor  to  cease.  I  wondered  at 
this,  and  if  it  implied  weariness  on  its  part,  and 
it  was  instantly  replied :  "  We  always  answer  to 
your  mind;  when  that  ceases  to  act,  there  ceases 
to  be  the  reaction."  I  cried  out  in  my  mind  in 
utter  bewilderment  "  Objective  or  subjective  ? " 
and,  longing  for  some  diverson  of  my  mind  from 
the  train  of  thought,  called  on  the  guides  to  make 
a  "  blaze,"  and  I  felt  that  the  physical  light  would 
be  a  relief  to  the  mental  obscurity.  In  the  course 
of  a  few  minutes,  the  guides  had  piled  on  the  fire 
a  huge  mass  of  the  finer  branches  of  the  trees 
which  had  served  us  for  fuel,  and  the  immense 
column  of  flames  which  rose,  frightening  the  birds 
from  their  perches,  into  a  confused  clamour, 
threw  into  the  shanty  a  heat  which  made  me 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  249 

drowsy,  and  when  my  companions  returned  from 
their  row  I  was  asleep. 

It  was  determined  the  next  morning  in  council 
to  move;  and  one  of  the  guides  informing  me 
that  there  had  been  opened  a  new  "carry"  by 
which  we  might  cross  from  the  Upper  Tupper's 
Lake,  ten  miles  up  the  Bog  River,  directly  to  the 
Forked  Lake,  and  thence  following  the  usual 
route  down  the  Raquette  River  and  through  Long 
Lake,  we  could  reach  Martin's  on  Saranack  Lakes, 
where  we  should  find  our  conveyances  out  to  the 
settlements,  with  only  a  short  retracing  of  the 
road  we  had  come  by,  we  hurriedly  packed  our 
traps  after  breakfast  and  were  off. 

The  boating  up  Bog  River  is  hard  work;  there 
are  many  shallows  over  which  the  boats  must  be 
dragged,  and  "carries"  round  which  everything 
must  be  carried  on  the  backs  of  the  men,  one  of 
these  being  three  miles  long,  so  that,  work  as  we 
all  might,  the  day  had  drawn  to  a  close  before 
we  were  well  embarked  on  the  upper  lake,  and 
it  was  nightfall  before  we  reached  the  camp,  left 
by  a  former  visitor,  where  we  intended  to  sleep. 
I  had  worked  hard  all  day,  always  sharing  the 
work  of  the  guides,  but  in  a  dreamy  state,  as  if 
the  dead-weights  I  carried  were  only  the  phantoms 
of  something,  and  I  was  a  fantasy  carrying  them 
— the  actual  had  become  visionary,  and  my  imag 
inations  nudged  and  jostled  me  almost  off  the 
ways  of  reason.  But  I  had  no  time  for  a  stance 
with  the  Daemon,  and  the  fatigue  left  me  too 
disposed  for  sleep  to  allow  of  night-questionings. 


250  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

The  next  day  we  had  several  miles  of  new  paths 
to  bush  out,  cutting  the  smaller  trees,  for  we 
found  the  information  as  to  the  road  to  be  in 
correct  ;  so  that,  in  fact,  we  had  two  days  of  severe 
chopping  and  dragging  before  we  were  again  in 
boating  regions.  All  this  had  put  me  into  a 
healthier  state  of  mind  than  I  had  been  in  for 
a  long  time,  for  I  had  come  into  the  woods  very 
much  exhausted  by  overwork,  to  which  was  due, 
probably,  my  wanderings  of  imagination ;  and  the 
day  or  two  following,  devoted  to  the  work  of 
the  camp,  with  the  necessary  fishing  and  hunting 
required  to  keep  a  large  party  of  men  with  re 
newed  appetites,  gave  me,  the  master  of  the  hunt 
and  commissary-general,  too  much  to  do  to  think 
of  mental  phenomena.  But  the  hurry  over  and 
repose  come,  the  mental  condition  returned.  Re 
commencing  the  migration  towards  home,  we  ran 
down  the  lake  to  its  outlet,  and,  as  we  turned  a 
point,  a  wide  and  picturesque  view  came  into 
sight — a  long  vista,  at  the  extreme  distance  of 
which  rose  a  faint,  solitary  peak,  to  which  Steve 
pointed,  saying  with  a  tone  of  emphasis,  "Blue 
Mountain."  The  effect  was  to  attach  to  the 
distant  peak  the  glamour  of  the  mental  condi 
tion  in  which  I  had  been:  a  strange  and  unac 
countable  attraction  to  it  came  over  me,  as  if 
some  fatality  awaited  me  there,  the  solution  of 
the  mysterious  influences  which  I  had  been  under 
during  the  days  past.  I  have  thought  of  it  since, 
many  times;  and  have  noticed  in  more  than  one 
case  of  insanity  with  which  I  had  come  into 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  251 

contact,  that  when  the  diseased  mind  had  been 
prepared  by  some  circumstance  for  a  new  delu 
sion,  the  slightest  trifle  sufficed  to  create  it. 
From  that  moment  my  mind  was  "  suggestioned," 
to  use  a  word  much  employed  lately  to  define 
what  we  still  cannot  any  better  explain,  by  the 
idea  of  something  to  be  seen  or  learned  at  the 
Blue  Mountain,  of  which  the  only  notable  fact 
that  I  could  learn  was  that  it  was,  as  I  could 
see,  a  solitary  peak  in  the  midst  of  a  chain  of 
small  lakes,  difficult  of  access,  and,  therefore, 
almost  unvisited.  My  plans  for  the  summer 
were  to  see  my  friends  through  their  visit  to 
the  lakes;  and  when  they  had  used  up  their 
vacation  to  see  them  off,  and  return  to  the 
most  primeval  forest  remaining  and  spend  the 
remainder  of  the  summer  there,  until  the  cold  of 
autumn  drove  me  back.  The  run  down  the 
Raquette  River  occupied  several  days  of  motion 
and  hard  work,  and  there  was  no  opening  for 
my  delusions.  The  company  once  consigned  to 
civilisation  again,  I  took  my  way  back  to  the 
upper  waters,  and  with  Steve  and  Carlo  alone 
for  society,  built  myself  a  comfortable  camp  on 
the  Raquette  Lake,  within  sight  of  the  Blue 
Mountain.  Steve  objected  to  fighting  our  way 
up  there;  for,  after  all,  we  were  still  more  or 
less  dependent  on  the  half-civilisation  of  the 
trappers  and  squatters  who  were  here  and  there 
to  be  found  on  the  principal  lakes,  where  they 
carried  on  in  winter  the  business  of  "lumbering," 
cutting  and  hauling  the  trees  which  form  the 


252  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

value  of  the  mountain  region,  too  remote  from 
all  communication  with  the  ways  of  commerce  to 
be  useful  for  cultivation,  and  too  barren  when 
the  forest  is  cleared  away.  The  occasional  log- 
cabins,  which  form  the  headquarters  for  the 
lumbermen  in  the  winter,  generally  furnish  sup 
plies  for  the  hunters  and  fishermen  for  the  part 
of  the  year  when  sporting  is  possible,  and  from 
them  we  were  obliged  to  draw  our  flour,  salt 
pork,  etc.  etc.,  which,  with  the  game  and  fish 
which  we  caught,  formed  our  subsistence.  On 
the  Blue  Lakes  there  was  not  a  settler,  and  for 
many  miles  from  it,  measured  as  the  distances 
are  there  measured,  through  labyrinths  of  forest 
and  meandering  streams,  which  are  often  the 
only  way  by  which,  with  great  labour,  one  can 
force  his  way  through,  no  human  habitation 
existed.  Steve  had  not  my  motive  for  getting 
there,  and  knew  the  hardships  too  well  to  be 
willing  to  put  himself  in  the  way  of  them  use 
lessly:  his  wood-craft  was  older  than  mine,  and 
so  I  submitted  to  his  judgment  and  we  camped 
on  Raquette  Lake.  In  all  the  operations  of 
settling  for  some  weeks,  finding  subjects  for  my 
sketching  and  making  the  camp  comfortable,  my 
mind  was  healthily  occupied,  and  I  heard  nothing 
of  my  ghostly  friend;  till,  one  evening  when 
I  had  paddled  out  on  the  lake  to  enjoy  the 
night  and  the  multitude  of  its  stars,  which 
never  elsewhere  seemed  so  great  as  in  that  pure 
air,  I  felt  it  beside  me  without  warning. 
"Well,"  I  said,  "you  have  come  back." 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  253 

"Come  back!"  it  said.  "Will  you  never  get 
rid  of  your  miserable  notions  of  space,  and  learn 
that  there  is  no  separation  but  that  of  feeling, 
no  nearness  but  that  of  sympathy?  If  you  had 
cared  enough  to  be  near  us,  we  should  have  been 
with  you  constantly." 

I  was  anxious  to  get  to  the  subject  of  latent 
interest,  and  did  not  care  to  discuss  a  point  which 
in  one  and  the  highest  sense  I  was  agreed  with 
the  Daemon  on.  "What,"  I  asked,  "was  that 
impulse  which  urges  me  to  go  to  the  Blue  Moun 
tain?  Shall  I  find  there  anything  supernatural?" 

"Anything  supernatural?  What  is  there  above 
nature  or  outside  of  it?" 

"But  nothing  is  without  cause;  and,  for  an 
emotion  so  strong  as  I  experienced  on  the  sight  of 
that  mountain,  there  must  have  been  one."  I  was, 
without  knowing  it,  already  under  the  control  of 
the  influence,  be  it  delusion,  be  it  mystery,  which 
had  possessed  me,  and  I  no  longer  resisted  the 
impression  of  its  reality.  I  began  to  feel  it  as  a  re 
sponsible  being,  something  beyond  and  above  me. 

"  Very  likely !  If  you  go  after  the  cause  you  will 
find  it !  Did  you  expect  to  find  some  beautiful 
enchantress  keeping  her  court  on  the  mountain- 
top  with  a  suite  of  fairies?" 

I  winced ;  for,  absurd  as  it  may  seem,  that  very 
idea,  half-formed,  undeveloped  from  the  latent 
self-ridicule  involved  in  it,  had  appeared  to  my 
consciousness  though  I  had  hardly  recognised  it 
I  replied,  at  a  loss  for  a  reply,  "  And  are  there  no 
such  things  possible  ?  " 


254  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

"All  things  are  possible  to  the  imagination." 

"To  create?" 

"  Most  certainly !  Is  not  creation  the  act 
of  bringing  into  existence?  and  does  not  your 
Hamlet  exist  as  immortally  and  really  as  your 
Shakespeare?  The  only  true  existence,  is  it  not 
that  of  the  idea?  Have  you  not  seen  the  pines 
transfigured  ?  " 

"  And  if  I  imagined  a  race  of  fairies  inhabiting 
the  Blue  Mountain,  should  I  find  them?" 

"  If  you  imagined  them,  yes !  But  the  imagina 
tion  is  not  voluntary;  it  works  to  supply  a 
necessity ;  its  function  is  creation,  and  creation  is 
needed  only  to  fill  a  vacuum.  The  wild  Arab, 
feeling  his  own  insignificance,  and  comprehending 
the  necessity  of  a  Creating  Power,  finds  between 
himself  and  that  Power,  which  to  him,  as  to  you 
the  other  day,  assumes  a  personality,  an  immense 
distance,  and  fills  the  space  with  an  intermediate 
race,  half-divine,  half-human.  It  was  the  mental 
necessity  for  the  fairy  which  created  the  fairy. 
You  do  not  feel  the  same  distance  between  your 
self  and  the  Creator,  and  so  you  do  not  call  into 
existence  a  creative  race  of  the  same  character — 
the  attempts  of  an  enlightened  race  to  write  new 
fairy  stories,  not  believing  in  fairies,  shows  the  in 
compatibility ;  but  has  not  your  own  imagination 
furnished  you  with  images  to  which  you  may  give 
your  reverence?  It  may  be  that  you  diminish 
that  distance  by  degrading  the  Great  First  Cause 
to  an  image  of  your  own  personality,  and  so  you 
are  not  as  wise  as  the  Arab,  who  at  once  admits  it 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  255 

to  be  incomprehensible  and  therefore  beyond  his 
thought.  Each  man  shapes  that  which  he  looks 
up  to  by  his  fears  or  his  desires,  and  these  in  their 
turn  are  the  results  of  his  development  and  the 
measure  of  its  degree." 

"  But  God  the  Father,  is  He  not  the  Great  First 
Cause,  the  Supreme  Creator  ?  " 

"Is  it  not  as  we  said,  that  you  measure  the 
Supreme  by  yourself?  Can  you  not  comprehend 
a  supreme  law,  an  order  which  controls  all 
things?"  This  touched  on  a  theme  which  I  had 
a  dread  of  opening  to  myself,  having  once  already 
had  an  experience  of  scepticism  which  left  painful 
memories,  and  I  did  not  think  a  distinct  reply. 
The  Daemon,  after  a  pause,  went  on:  "You  seem 
always  to  depend  on  a  form  for  your  recognitions ; 
is  not  a  form  the  result  of  some  action,  and  how 
can  the  result  be  the  finality  ?  Every  form  is  the 
form  of  something;  of  what  is  your  conception 
of  Deity  the  form  of?" 

Not  wishing  to  carry  this  subject  further,  for 
I  felt  my  incompetence  to  completely  master  it, 
and  the  recurrence  in  this  mysterious  manner  of 
the  question  which  had  forced  itself  on  me  at 
other  times  and  in  other  ways,  I  shrank  from 
this  discussion,  and,  as  the  hiatus  must  be  filled, 
I  turned  the  inquiry  on  my  interlocutor. 

"Tell  me,"  I  said;  "do  you  not  take  cognisance 
of  my  personality?  Do  you  read  my  past  and 
future  ?  " 

"Your  past  and  your  future  are  contained  in 
your  present.  Who  can  analyse  what  you  are, 


256  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

can  see  the  things  which  made  you  such;  for 
effect  contains  its  cause — to  see  the  future  it  needs 
only  to  know  the  laws  which  govern  all  things. 
It  is  a  simple  problem :  you  being  given,  with  the 
inevitable  tendencies  to  which  you  are  subject, 
the  result  is  your  future;  the  flight  of  one  of 
your  rifle  balls  cannot  be  calculated  with  greater 
certainty." 

"But  how  shall  we  learn  those  laws?"  I  asked. 

"You  contain  them  all,  for  you  are  the  result 
of  them;  and  they  are  always  the  same,  not  one 
for  your  beginning  and  another  for  your  continu 
ance.  Man  is  the  complete  embodiment  of  all 
the  laws  thus  far  developed,  and  you  have  only 
to  know  yourself  to  know  the  history  of  creation." 

This  I  could  not  deny  to  be  true  in  one  sense; 
but,  wearied  and  perplexed,  I  declined  to  ask  any 
thing  further.  I  returned  to  camp  and  went  to 
sleep.  Several  days  passed  without  any  progress 
in  my  knowledge  of  this  strange  influence,  or 
what  it  might  be,  though  I  was  more  constantly 
sensible  to  its  pressure  every  day;  and,  at  the 
same  time,  the  incomprehensible  sympathy  with 
nature,  for  I  know  not  what  else  to  call  it,  seemed 
growing  stronger  as  the  time  went  on  and  more 
startling  in  the  effects  it  produced  on  the  land 
scape.  The  influence  was  no  longer  confined  to 
twilight,  but  made  noonday  mystical ;  and  I  began 
to  hear  strange  sounds  and  words  spoken  by 
disembodied  voices,  as  had  once  before  happened 
at  the  beginning,  but  now  continually.  They 
were  not  accompanied  by  that  feeling  of  a  per- 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  257 

sonal  presence  as  when  the  Daemon  was  present. 
It  seemed  as  if  the  vibrations  in  the  air  shaped 
themselves  into  words,  some  of  them  of  the 
strangest  and  most  unexpected  significance.  I 
heard  my  name  called,  and  on  one  occasion 
actually  crossed  the  lake  to  ferry  over  what  I 
supposed  to  be  a  friend  come  to  see  me ;  and  heard 
wild  laughing  at  night.  I  asked  the  Daemon  what 
it  meant,  and  only  received  a  guarded  answer, 
"You  would  be  wiser  not  knowing  too  much." 

Ere  many  days  of  this  solitary  life  had  passed, 
alone  mentally,  for  with  Steve  I  never  conversed 
but  of  the  material  want  of  our  condition,  I  found 
my  whole  existence  taken  up  with  these  fantasies. 
I  determined  to  make  my  excursion  to  the  Blue 
Mountain;  and  sending  Steve  down  to  the  post- 
office,  a  three  days'  trip,  I  took  my  boat,  with 
Carlo  and  my  rifle  and  two  days'  food,  and  pushed 
off.  The  outlet  of  the  Blue  Mountain  lakes,  like 
those  of  all  the  Adirondack  lakes,  is  narrow,  dark, 
and  shut  in  by  forest,  which  scarcely  permits 
landing  anywhere.  Now  and  then  a  log  fallen 
into  the  stream  compels  the  voyager  to  get  out 
and  lift  his  boat  over;  then  a  shallow  rapid  must 
be  dragged  over;  and  when  the  stream  is  clear 
of  obstructions,  it  is  too  narrow  for  any  mode 
of  propulsion  but  poling  or  paddling.  I  worked 
along  in  these  various  ways  till  long  past  mid 
day,  and  then  I  came  out  on  a  wide  stretch  of 
marshy  land,  through  which  the  stream  filtered 
with  scarcely  a  visible  or  navigable  channel,  and 
beyond  which  lay  the  lake,  and  beyond  the  lake 


258  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

the  Blue  Mountain,  the  foreground  being  occupied 
with  fir  scrub  a  few  feet  high,  and  partly  shutting 
out  of  view  the  lake  itself,  along  the  shore  of 
which  was  the  usual  line  of  forest  trees,  amongst 
them  occasional  tall  white  pines,  like  those  which 
had  at  first  bewildered  me.  Of  these,  two  stood 
at  the  exit  of  the  stream  from  the  lake,  and 
already  the  weird  feeling  of  the  earlier  days 
seized  me.  They  seemed  to  forbid  my  entrance. 
I  drew  up  my  boat  on  the  boggy  shore  and 
climbed  into  the  tallest  tamarack  that  grew  there, 
high  enough  to  look  over  the  low  wood  and  see 
the  farther  shore  of  the  lake  itself. 

Never  shall  I  forget  what  I  saw  from  that 
swaying  lookout.  Before  me  was  the  mountain, 
clothed  in  forest  to  within  a  few  hundred  feet 
from  the  summit,  which  showed  bare  rock  with 
firs  clinging  in  the  clefts  and  on  the  tables,  and 
which  was  crowned  by  what  seemed  to  me  a 
walled  city,  the  parapets  of  whose  walls  cut 
with  a  sharp,  straight  line  against  the  sky,  and 
beyond  showed  spire  and  turret  and  the  tops  of 
tall  trees.  The  walls  must  have  been,  to  my 
measuring,  at  least  a  hundred  feet  high,  gauged 
by  the  trees,  and  I  could  see  here  and  there 
between  the  groups  of  firs  traces  of  a  road 
coming  down  the  mountain  side.  In  a  saner 
moment,  I  should  have  seen  that  this  was  only 
the  accident  of  the  formation,  but  then  it  kindled 
me  like  inspiration.  And  then  I  heard  one  of 
those  mocking  voices  in  the  air  say,  "The  city 
of  Silence,"  as  one  had  before  said,  "The  pro- 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  259 

cession  of  the  Anakim."  It  seemed  at  the  moment 
that  I  had  only  to  launch  through  the  air  to 
reach  the  city,  and  why  I  did  not  attempt  it  I 
could  hardly  say.  My  blood  rushed  through  my 
veins  with  a  mad  energy,  and  my  brain  seemed 
to  have  been  replaced  by  some  ethereal  substance 
and  to  be  capable  of  floating  me  off  as  if  it  were 
a  balloon.  Yet  I  clung  and  looked,  my  whole 
soul  in  my  eyes,  and  had  no  thought  of  losing 
the  spectacle  even  for  an  instant,  were  it  to 
reach  the  city  itself.  The  glorious  glamour  of 
that  place  and  moment,  who  can  comprehend 
it?  The  wind  swung  my  tree-top  to  and  fro, 
and  I  climbed  up  it  until  the  tree  bent  with  my 
weight  like  a  twig  with  a  bird's. 

Presently  I  heard  bells  and  strains  of  music, 
as  though  all  the  military  bands  of  a  large  city 
were  coming  together  on  the  walls;  and  the 
sounds  rose  and  fell  with  the  wind — one  moment 
entirely  lost,  another  full  and  triumphant.  Then 
I  heard  the  sound  of  hunting  horns  and  the 
baying  of  a  pack  of  hounds,  deep-mouthed,  as 
if  a  hunting  party  were  coming  down  the  moun 
tain-side.  Nearer  and  nearer  they  came,  and 
I  heard  merry  laughing  and  shouting  as  they 
swept  through  the  valley,  and  I  had  a  horrible 
dread  lest  they  should  find  me  and  drive  me, 
intruding,  from  the  enchanted  land. 

The  agitation  grew  so  that  I  determined,  coute 
qui  coute,  to  fathom  the  mystery.  I  descended 
to  the  ground  and  pushed  my  way  through  to 
the  lake.  Near  the  guardian  pines  they  lost 


260  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

their  menace;  and  when  I  had,  after  long  and 
hard  work,  launched  my  boat  on  the  waters,  I 
found  no  mystery — the  mountain-top  before  me 
was  a  common-place  mountain-top,  and  all  the 
enchantment  had  withdrawn  again.  There  was 
a  fever  in  my  blood,  and  a  fainting  weakness 
took  the  place  of  the  mad  enthusiasm  of  an 
hour  before.  I  felt  that  to  return  to  Raquette 
Lake  was  beyond  my  powers,  and  to  pass  the 
night  there  was  nothing  but  to  sleep  under  my 
overturned  boat  on  the  fir  branches.  With  Carlo 
to  keep  guard,  I  knew  that  I  was  in  no  danger 
from  the  wolves,  and  I  had  food  enough  for  him 
and  me.  I  looked  about  the  lake  to  find  the 
most  promising  place  for  a  sleeping-place,  with 
a  water-source;  and,  while  I  watched,  I  caught 
sight  of  a  thin  column  of  smoke  rising  from  the 
trees  at  the  farther  end  of  the  sheet  of  water. 

Sick  from  the  reaction  of  my  delusions,  in 
wardly  ashamed  of  them  and  of  myself,  I 
paddled  slowly  down  to  the  place  whence  the 
smoke  arose.  I  found  there  a  camp,  deserted 
for  the  moment;  and,  drawing  the  boat  up  on 
the  shore,  I  sat  down  on  the  bed  of  branches 
in  the  camp  to  await  the  return  of  the  owner 
and  ask  for  a  night's  lodging.  I  was  weak,  and, 
trembling  from  the  reaction,  for  the  eager  quest 
of  the  morning  was  dead,  I  fell  asleep,  and  woke 
at  the  growl  of  Carlo,  announcing  an  approaching 
footstep.  The  owner  of  the  camp  was  not  far 
away,  and  welcomed  me  in  his  rough  cordiality, 
with  few  words,  to  share  his  lodgings.  He  was 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  261 

a  trapper  engaged  in  running  his  lines  for  the 
next  winter's  sable  trapping.  He  cut  some 
venison  steaks  and  I  produced  some  bread,  which 
he  had  not  eaten  for  days,  and  we,  having  eaten 
heartily,  lay  down  and  slept  till  daylight.  How 
dull  and  grey  the  landscape  was  in  the  morning 
twilight!  My  host,  willing  to  take  the  oppor 
tunity  to  go  down  to  Wilbur's  on  Raquette  Lake 
for  supplies,  accepted  my  invitation  to  a  seat  in 
my  boat  and  give  me  the  aid  of  his  stronger 
arm  to  work  our  way  back.  The  dull  and 
matter-of-fact  life  of  the  next  day  or  two  was 
beyond  my  power  to  lighten  by  any  effort  or 
labour,  and  it  was  not  till  three  or  four  days 
had  passed  that  I  cared  to  approach  my  Daemon. 
To  my  question  as  to  the  meaning  of  my  experi 
ence  of  a  few  days  before,  it  replied,  "It  was  a 
freak  of  your  imagination." 

"  But  what  is  this  imagination,  then  ? "  I  asked, 
"which,  being  a  faculty  of  my  own,  yet  masters 
my  reason?" 

"  Not  at  all  a  faculty,  but  your  very  highest  self, 
your  own  life  in  an  activity,  perhaps  abnormal, 
or  even  morbid,  but  always  your  own  life  in 
creative  function.  Your  reason  is  a  faculty,  and 
is  always  subject  to  the  purposes  of  your  ima 
gination.  If,  instead  of  regarding  imagination 
as  an  appendage  to  your  mental  organisation, 
you  had  conceived  it  as  it  is,  the  highest 
state  of  your  whole  being,  your  life  in  its 
noblest  function,  you  would  have  seen  why  it 
is  that  it  works  unconsciously,  just  as  you  live 


262  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

unconsciously  and  involuntarily.  Men  set  their 
reason  and  feeling  to  subdue  what  they  consider 
a  treacherous  element  in  themselves;  they  only 
succeed  in  dwarfing  their  natures  and  material 
ising  and  stifling  their  best  selves,  and  succeed 
in  keeping  imagination  inert  while  reason  has 
the  control;  but  when  reason  rests  in  sleep  and 
you  cease  to  live  to  the  material  world,  imagina 
tion  resumes  its  normal  power.  You  dream;  it 
is  only  the  revival  or  imperfect  issue  of  the 
creation  you  suppress  when  awake.  You  consider 
the  sights  and  sounds  of  your  late  experience  to 
be  follies;  you  reason — imagination  demonstrates 
its  power  by  overturning  your  reason  and  deceiv 
ing  your  very  senses.  The  madman,  in  whom 
reason  has  gone  definitely  to  sleep,  has  nothing 
left  him  but  his  imagination  and  the  habits  of 
his  appetites;  but  his  imagination  has  only  lost 
the  guide  to  its  evolution,  which  is  all  that  your 
reason  is." 

"You  speak  of  its  creations,"  I  replied.  "I 
understand  this  in  a  certain  sense;  but,  if  these 
were  such,  would  they  not  insist  on  permanence? 
and  can  anything  created  perish?" 

"  Nonsense !  what  will  these  trees  be  to-morrow  ? 
and  the  rocks  you  are  sitting  on,  are  they  not 
changing  to  vegetation  under  you?  The  only 
creation  is  that  of  ideas;  things  are  thin  shadows. 
If  man  is  not  imaginative — i.e.,  creative — he  is 
still  undeveloped," 

"But  is  not  such  an  assumption  trenching  on 
the  supremacy  of  God?"  I  asked. 


THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT  263 

"  What  do  you  understand  by  '  God,'  and  where 
do  you  place  Him  ?  " 

"An  infinitely  wise  and  loving  Controller  of 
events,  of  course,"  I  said.  "I  do  not  attempt  to 
define  Him,  but  I  recognise  Him." 

"Did  you  ever  find  anyone  whose  ideas  of  God 
were  the  same  as  your  own?"  it  asked. 

"Not  entirely." 

"Then  your  God  is  not  the  same  as  the  God  of 
other  men;  from  the  Feejeean  to  the  Christian 
there  is  a  wide  range.  Of  course,  there  is  a  first 
great  principle  of  life;  but  this  personality  you 
all  worship — is  it  not  a  creation  of  your  own?" 

I  now  felt  this  to  be  the  ultimate  end  of  the 
Daemon's  urging:  it  recurred  too  often  not  to 
be  designed.  Led  on  by  the  sophistry  of  the 
Tempter.  I  had  floated  on  unconsciously  to  this 
issue,  practically  admitting,  and  half-believing  all; 
but  when  this  suggestion  stood  completely  un 
clothed  before  me,  everything  in  me  revolted 
from  the  abyss  it  opened.  For  an  instant  all 
was  chaos,  and  the  very  order  of  nature  seemed 
disorder.  Life  and  light  vanished  from  the  face 
of  the  earth;  my  night  made  all  things  dead 
and  dark.  An  universe  without  a  God !  Creation 
seemed  in  that  moment  but  a  galvanised  corpse. 
"SVhat  my  emotions  were  in  that  brief  space  no 
one  who  has  not  felt  them  can  conceive.  My 
first  impulse  was  to  finish  with  all  questionings 
in  death;  with  the  next  I  was  swept  back  to  the 
old  life  of  unhesitating  faith  and  daily  reverence 
for  the  Creator,  and  I  cried  from  the  depth  of 


264  THE  SUBJECTIVE  OF  IT 

despair,  "God  deliver  me  from  the  body  of  this 
death!"  It  was  but  a  moment — and  then  there 
came  in  the  place  of  the  cold  questioning  voice 
of  the  Daemon  one  of  ineffable  music,  repeating 
words  familiar  from  my  childhood  and  lovely  in 
my  past,  "Ye  believe  in  God — believe  also  in  me." 
The  hot  tears  for  another  moment  blotted  out 
the  world  from  sight.  I  said  passionately  to  the 
questioner,  "Now,  who  are  you?  what  are  you?" 
"Your  own  doubts,"  was  the  reply,  and  it  was  as 
if  I  spoke  to  myself.  Little  by  little  I  grew 
clearer,  and  after  the  state  had  long  gone  by,  it 
seemed  as  if  I  had  been  in  a  long  and  troubled 
dream.  But  the  experience  never  came  back — 
the  lesson  was  learned. 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

I  REMEMBER  that  in  one  of  his  early  letters  to  me, 
Professor  Ruskin  expressed  the  opinion  that  the 
character  of  American  landscape  was  such  as  not 
to  favour  invention,  but  that  its  largeness  must 
give  the  art  a  high  degree  of  grandeur,  once 
excited.  It  was  true,  for  the  sameness  of  the  wild 
nature  is  not  much  relieved  by  the  incomplete 
domestication,  where  men  have  improved  its 
humanisation  —  it  lacks  the  appeals  to  human 
sympathy  and  imagination  which  are  made  by 
the  landscape  of  an  old  country,  and  what 
Theodore  Rousseau  used  to  call  intimit£,  which  is 
partially  interpreted  by  our  feeling  of  association — 
the  presence  of  a  "light  that  never  was  on  sea 
or  land."  I  have  always  found  that  it  lacked  the 
quality  of  the  pictorial,  which  is  so  abounding  in 
English  and  Italian  scenery  and  some  parts  of 
the  lands  of  France,  and  the  search  for  the  pictur 
esque  was  one  of  the  great  pre-occupations  of  the 
landscape  painter  when  I  was  a  student.  In  de 
fault  of  a  motive  in  the  familiar  scenes,  we  used 
to  frequent  the  wild  ones,  and  the  great,  un- 
tracked  wildernesses  of  the  Northern  states  were 
a  field  of  study  and  search  of  emotion  —  the 
sentiment  of  savage  nature,  since  the  picturesque 
was  not  at  our  doors.  The  huge  forest  of  the 

30QQ 


266  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

Adirondack  region  of  New  York  state,  threaded 
by  rivers,  and  interspersed  with  lakes  of  all  sizes 
from  Champlain,  where  fleets  once  fought,  to  the 
tiny  sheets  of  water  where  the  skiff  passes  with 
difficulty  through  the  fields  of  pond-lilies,  was 
that  which  most  caught  my  imagination ;  and  for 
several  years  I  passed  the  summer  there,  more 
fascinated  by  the  solitude  and  savagery  of  it  than 
by  anything  paintable  I  found  there.  The  rela 
tions  with  Lowell  and  the  University  town  of 
Cambridge,  alluded  to  in  another  paper,  led  him 
and  some  of  his  friends  to  share  the  fortunes  of 
one  of  my  excursions,  recorded  in  "The  Sub 
jective  of  It,"  and  from  this  to  the  formation  of 
a  club,  known  as  the  Adirondack,  amongst  whose 
members  were  Lowell,  Emerson,  Agassiz,  Professor 
Jeffries  Wyman  (the  rare  scientific  genius  taken 
from  his  studies  too  soon  for  the  honour  of  his 
country),  Dr  Estes  Howe,  Judge  Hoar  (General 
Grant's  Attorney -General  later  on),  S.  G.  Ward, 
J.  M.  Forbes,  and  others  amongst  the  leading 
personages  of  Boston  and  Cambridge.  The  club 
existed  until  the  war  absorbed  all  the  thought  of 
its  members,  and  the  estate  of  over  20,000  acres 
of  untouched  and  primitive  forest  in  the  wildest 
and  most  beautiful  part  of  the  Adirondacks  was 
allowed  to  be  re-conveyed  to  the  lumber  cutters. 
But  the  first  meeting  was  of  unique  interest, 
from  its  having  given  rise  to  incidents  and  records 
which  survived  the  duration  of  the  club.  Chief 
amongst  these  is  the  poem  in  which  Emerson  re 
corded  his  impressions  of  the  first  contact  with 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  267 

primeval  nature.  The  excursion  also  brought  the 
section  into  an  unenviable  notoriety,  and  so  set 
the  fashion  of  luxurious  camping  out,  and  pur 
chase  of  tracts  of  land  in  the  forest,  which  have, 
in  the  sequence,  destroyed  its  original  character 
altogether.  Then  the  wolf  howled  and  the  bear 
prowled  about  our  camps,  and  more  than  once 
have  I  heard  the  cry  of  the  panther  (Felis  puma) 
as  it  skirted  our  vicinity ;  the  grey  eagle  was  al 
most  the  commonest  of  birds,  and  one  might  pass 
a  fortnight  in  the  forest  without  seeing  another 
human  being.  The  estate,  which  we  afterwards 
purchased  at  tax  sale,  included  a  pretty  lake  a  mile 
and  a  half  long,  with  islands,  all  untouched  still 
by  the  lumberer's  axe,  the  forest  standing  as  it 
had  stood  before  Columbus  sailed  from  Palos ;  and 
the  larger  lake  where  we  made  our  initiatory 
meeting,  though  of  easier  access,  was  in  the 
same  condition.  The  condition  of  the  club  meet 
ing  was,  that  for  six  weeks  the  camp  should 
be  open  to  all  the  members  and  guests  invited 
by  the  committee,  after  or  before  which  members 
were  free  to  invite  their  friends  and  occupy  the 
camp  without  restriction,  each  person  having  his 
own  guide  and  boat  and  exploring  the  forest 
around  or  remaining  in  camp  at  pleasure,  forming 
parties  or  moving  independently,  lapsing  as  far 
as  might  be  into  the  original  state  of  society. 

The  mountain  country,  which  is  known  collec 
tively  as  the  "  Adirondack,"  is  an  elevated  plateau 
of  the  Laurentian  range,  lying  between  the  valleys 
of  the  Mohawk  and  St  Lawrence,  deeply  cut  by 


268  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

vales  and  gorges  amongst  the  granite  hills,  and 
in  every  depression  holding  a  lake,  the  water 
connection  of  which,  with  its  companions,  gives 
rise  to  the  characteristic  feature  of  the  region, 
each  chain  of  lakes  forming  a  water  -  course, 
through  which  lie  the  routes  which  explore  the 
entire  region,  it  being  rarely  the  case  that  more 
than  a  mile  separates  the  water  of  one  chain 
from  that  of  another.  The  guides  use  light  boats, 
which  they  can  easily  carry  on  their  shoulders 
from  one  water  to  the  next,  and  so  they  traverse 
the  entire  mountain  country  freely.  The  lake 
where  our  first  encampment  was  made  was  known 
as  Follansbee  Pond  (the  term  lake  being,  in  the 
section,  reserved  for  a  sheet  of  several  miles  in 
length),  and  it  lies  in  a  cul-de-sac  of  the  chain  of 
lakes  and  streams  named  after  one  of  the  first 
of  the  Jesuit  explorers  of  the  northern  states, 
Pere  Raquette.  Being  elected  captain  of  the 
hunt  and  chief  guide  of  the  club,  it  depended  on 
me  also,  as  the  oldest  woodsman,  to  select  the 
locality  and  superintend  the  construction  of  the 
camp,  and  the  choice  was  determined  by  the 
facility  of  access,  the  abundance  of  game,  and  the 
fact  that  the  lake  was  out  of  any  route  to  regions 
beyond,  giving  the  maximum  of  seclusion,  as  the 
etiquette  of  the  woods  prevented  another  party 
camping  near  us. 

Follansbee  was  then  a  rare  and  beautiful  piece 
of  untouched  nature,  divided  from  the  highway, 
the  Raquette,  by  a  marsh  of  several  miles  of 
weary  navigation,  shut  in  by  the  hills  on  all  sides 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  269 

but  that  by  which  we  entered,  the  forest  still 
unscarred,  and  the  tall  white  pines  standing  in 
files  along  the  lake  shores  and  up  over  the  ridges, 
not  a  scar  of  axe  or  fire  being  visible  as  we 
searched  the  shore  for  a  fitting  spot  to  make  our 
vacation  lodging-place.  Many  things  are  requisite 
for  a  good  camping-ground,  and  to  fix  one  is  a 
thing  to  be  learned.  First  and  indispensable  is  a 
spring  of  good  water  near  by;  then  a  dry  and 
elevated  plateau,  wooded  with  "hard  wood," — 
beeches,  birch,  and  maple — with  level  ground  for 
the  camp,  free  from  the  tangle  of  undergrowth 
which  makes  the  fir  thicket  impenetrable ;  then 
a  smooth  sandy  beach  on  which  the  boats  may 
be  drawn  at  night,  and  which  may  be  approached 
without  danger  from  the  rocks,  and  on  which 
loading  or  unloading  is  easy.  Ours  was  one  of 
the  best  I  have  ever  seen — at  the  head  of  the  lake, 
with  beach,  spring,  and  maple  grove.  Two  of  the 
hugest  maples  I  ever  saw  gave  us  the  shelter  of 
their  spreading  branches  and  the  supports  to  the 
camp  walls.  Here  we  placed  our  ridge-pole,  laid 
our  roof  of  bark  of  firs  (stripped  from  trees  far 
away  in  the  forest,  not  to  disfigure  our  dwelling- 
place  with  stripped  and  dying  trees),  cut  an  open 
path  to  the  lake-side,  and  then  left  our  house  to 
the  naiads  and  dryads,  and  hurried  back  forty 
miles  to  meet  our  guests  at  Martin's  Landing. 

A  generation  has  gone  by  since  that  unique 
meet,  and  of  those  who  were  at  it  only  John 
Holmes  (a  younger  brother  of  Oliver  Wendell) 
and  I  now  survive.  The  voices  of  that  merry 


270  THE   PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

assemblage  of  "wise  and  polite"  vacation-keepers 
come  to  us  from  the  land  of  dreams ;  the  echoes 
they  wakened  in  the  wild  wood  give  place  to  the 
tender  and  tearful  evocation  of  poetic  memory ; 
they  and  their  summering  have  passed  into  the 
traditions  of  the  later  camp-fires,  where  the  guides 
tell  of  the  "Philosophers'  Camp,"  of  the  very 
location  of  which  they  have  lost  the  knowledge. 
But  Emerson,  the  philosopher  whose  genius  was 
fittest  to  the  temple  in  which  we  all  worshipped, 
its  high  priest  and  oracle,  has  left  his  history 
of  the  meeting  in  his  poem,  "The  Adirondacs.  A 
Journal.  Dedicated  to  my  fellow  -  travellers  in 
August,  1858,"  and  to  which  my  prose  may  serve 
as  commentary,  to  be  written  before  I  have  done 
with  the  memory.  I,  the  youngest,  the  steward 
of  that  memorable  company,  the  master  of  the 
hunt,  the  insect  preserved  in  the  amber  of  the 
poet's  verse, 

"  Our  guide's  guide,  and  Commodore, 
Crusoe,  Crusader,  Pius  ^Eneas," 

purpose  to  frame,  even  if  in  a  poor  way,  this 
picture  of  a  gathering  unique  in  the  history  of 
vacations ;  this  record,  which  is  to  those  who 
know  and  love  unsophisticated  nature  the  most 
curiously  truthful  and  interesting  existing  revela 
tion  of  her  aspect,  seen  for  the  first  time  with  a 
mind  trained  to  the  finest  shades  of  impression 
and  reflection — the  most  Homeric  and  Hellenic  of 
all  nature-poems  ever  written. 

This  was  not  the  solitude  of  Thoreau's  Walden 
Pond,  where  isolation  kept  within  the  sound  of  a 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  271 

dinner-horn,  and  where  no  bird,  leaf,  or  tree  was 
ignorant  of  the  daily  footfall  of  idlers  and  curious, 
but  a  virgin  forest,  where  the  crack  of  our  rifles 
reached  no  other  human  ear,  and  where  the  care 
lessly  wandering  foot  found  no  path  to  lead  it 
back  to  camp,  and  the  inexpert,  once  out  of  hear 
ing  of  camp-call,  or  out  of  sight  of  the  water, 
was  in  imminent  danger  of  having  his  bones 
picked  by  the  wolves  that  listened  dismayed 
to  the  sounds  of  our  unaccustomed  invasion. 
This  was  "the  forest  primeval."  Hardly  a  trace 
of  it  now  exists  as  we  then  knew  it.  The 
lumberer;  the  reckless  sportsman  with  his 
camp-fires  and  his  more  reckless  and  careless 
guide;  the  axe  and  the  fire,  have  left  no  large 
expanse  of  virgin  forest  in  all  the  Adirondack 
region,  and  every  year  effaces  the  original  aspect 
of  it  more  completely.  Then  there  were  no 
song-birds,  companions  of  mankind;  no  familiar 
sound  of  the  paternal  fields  greeted  the  wise  men 
of  the  East :  but  the  weird  laugh  of  the  loon,  the 
scream  of  the  osprey  or  the  grey  eagle;  and  of 
the  minor  featherings,  the  friendly  Canada  jay 
or  the  chickadee,  only  greeted  us. 

I  had  done  all  I  could  to  induce  Longfellow  and 
Oliver  Wendell  Holmes  to  join  the  party,  but  the 
latter  was  too  closely  identified  with  the  Hub  in  all 
his  mental  operations  to  care  for  unhumanised 
nature,  and  Longfellow  was  too  strongly  attached 
to  the  conditions  of  completely  civilised  life  to 
enjoy  roughing  it  in  flannels  and  sleeping  on  fir 
boughs.  The  company  of  his  great-brained  friends 


272  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

was  a  temptation  at  times,  I  think ;  but  lie  hated 
killing  animals,  had.  no  interest  in  fishing,  and 
was  too  settled  in  his  habits  to  enjoy  so  great  a 
change.  Possibly  he  was  decided  in  his  refusal  by 
Emerson's  purchase  of  a  rifle.  "Is  it  true  that 
Emerson  is  going  to  take  a  gun?"  he  asked  me. 
"Yes,"  I  replied.  "Then  I  shall  not  go,"  he  said; 
"  somebody  will  be  shot." 

Emerson's  record  plunges  in  medias  res.    He  gives 
a  line  to  Champlain  : 

"Thence,  in  strong  country  cart,  rode  up  the  forks 
Of  the  Ausable  stream,  intent  to  reach 
The  Adirondac  lakes.     At  Martin's  Beach 
We  chose  our  boats,  each  man  a  boat  and  guide, 
Ten  men,  ten  guides,  our  company  all  told." 

But  here  I  must  correct  my  evangelist.  I  was 
Agassiz's  guide  and  rowed  my  own  boat,  sharing 
with  the  guides  whatever  work  there  was  for  all. 
I  could  not  have  kept  in  proper  subordination  so 
large  a  company  of  men,  collected  from  all  parts 
of  the  woods,  though  with  all  the  care  in  selection 
possible  under  the  circumstances,  if  I  had  not  been 
ready  to  do  my  share  of  any  work  I  called  on  them 
for.  I  not  only  rowed  my  own  boat,  but  carried 
my  own  axe  and  rifle,  and  my  boat  when  necessary. 
From  one  cause  I  missed,  to  my  infinite  regret,  the 
hearing  of  Emerson's  first  impressions  of  the  forest. 
I  had  been  building  a  new  boat  for  the  occasion, 
and  it  lacked  several  hours'  work  when  the  com 
pany  started  up  the  lakes  at  midday,  I  only 
following  toward  sunset,  and  overtaking  them  at 
midnight  at  the  "Indian  Carry,"  then  a  mere 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  273 

pathway  a  mile  long,  through  dense  pine  groves, 
between  the  Saranac  and  Raquette  chains  of  lakes, 
with  a  lumberer's  hut  at  each  end.  A  violent  rain 
storm  greeted  our  entry  into  the  wilderness,  and  I 
arrived  after  the  company  were  dried  and  had 
eaten,  myself  drenched  like  a  water-rat. 

Emerson  wrote  out  his  "Adirondacs"  after  he 
had  returned  to  Concord,  and  it  is  curious  to  see 
in  what  a  Greek  way  he  condensed  and  idealised 
his  impressions,  forgetting  all  details  which  inter 
fered  with  symmetry. 

"Next  morn  we  swept  with  oars  the  Saranac, 
With  skies  of  benediction,  to  Round  Lake, 
Where  all  the  sacred  mountains  drew  around  us, 
Tahawus,  Seaward,*  Maclntyre,  Baldhead, 
And  other  Titans  without  muse  or  name. 
Pleased  with  these  grand  companions,  we  glide  on, 
Instead  of  flowers,  crowned  with  a  wreath  of  hills. 
We  made  our  distance  wider,  boat  from  boat, 
As  each  would  hear  the  oracle  alone. 
By  the  bright  morn  the  gay  flotilla  slid 
Through  files  of  flags  that  gleamed  like  bayonets, 
Through  gold-moth-haunted  beds  of  pickerel-flower, 
Through  scented  banks  of  lilies  white  and  gold, 
Where  the  deer  feeds  at  night,  the  teal  by  day. 
On  through  the  Upper  Saranac,  and  up 
Pere  Raquette  stream,  to  a  small  tortuous  pass 
Winding  through  grassy  shallows  in  and  out, 
Two  creeping  miles  of  rushes,  pads,  and  sponge, 
To  Follansbee  Water  and  the  Lake  of  Loons." 

The  poet  has  painted  his  picture  with  the  group 
ing  of  an  artist's  imagination.  The  drenching  day 
of  arrival,  the  night  of  discomfort  at  the  hut  on 
the  "carry,"  and  the  "carry"  itself,  the  journey 

*  Mount  Seward,  south  of  the  Saranacs,  the  common  name  being 
repudiated  by  Emerson. 


274  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

through  the  "  Spectacle  Ponds,"  a  curious  and  most 
picturesque  part  of  the  second  day,  with  the  row 
down  the  charming  stream  that  forms  the  water 
way  to  the  Baquette  proper — all  are  dismissed 
as  useless  detail,  while  the  "two  creeping  miles" 
of  the  marshy  outlet  of  Follansbee,  up  which  we 
had  to  pole  and  push,  are  remembered  through 
Agassiz's  discovery  there  of  a  fresh-water  sponge 
till  then  unknown.  But  to  Emerson,  as  to  most 
men  who  are  receptive  to  nature's  message,  the 
forest  was  the  overpowering  fact. 

"  We  climb  the  bank, 
And  in  the  twilight  of  the  forest  noon 
Wield  the  first  axe  these  echoes  ever  heard." 

The  "twilight  of  the  forest  noon"  is  the  most 
concentrated  expression  of  the  one  dominant 
sentiment  of  a  poetic  mind  on  first  entering  this 
eternal  silence  and  shadow.  His  catalogue  of 
trees  is  in  error: 

"The  wood  was  sovran  with  centennial  trees — 
Oak,  cedar,  maple,  poplar,  beech,  and  fir, 
Linden  and  spruce." 

There  is  no  oak,  linden,  or  poplar  in  these  forests. 
He  had  passed  them  in  the  Ausable  valley  on  his 
way  up,  and  probably  forgot  their  exact  habitat. 
But  the  impression  of  the  first  night  clung  to  him 
with  all  its  detail.  No  modern  man  knew  the  "great 
god  Pan "  as  Emerson  knew  him, — not  even  Keats, 
— and  the  falling  asleep  in  the  arms  of  the  universal 
mother,  whose  dearest  child  Pan  was,  must  have 
left  its  influence  on  him  long  after  he  had  recorded 
the  poetic  version  of  the  experience. 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  275 

"  '  Welcome!'  the  wood-god  murmured  through  the  leaves, — 
'  Welcome,  though  late,  unknowing,  yet  known  to  me.' 
Evening  drew  on  ;  stars  peeped  through  maple-boughs, 
Which  o'erhung,  like  a  cloud,*  our  camping-fire. 
Decayed  millennial  trunks,  like  moonlight  flecks, 
Lit  with  phosphoric  crumbs  t  the  forest  iioor." 

Lowell  named  the  camping-place  "  Camp  Maple," 
from  the  huge  maples  under  which  we  had  pitched 
our  house  of  bark ;  but  tradition  has  long  known 
it  as  the  "  Philosophers'  Camp,"  though,  like  Troy, 
its  site  is  unknown  to  all  the  subsequent  genera 
tions  of  guides,  and  I  doubt  if  in  all  the  Adiron 
dack  country  there  is  a  man  except  my  old  guide, 
Steve  Martin,  who  could  point  out  the  place  where 
it  stood. 

To  me  the  forest  was  familiar.  I  knew  it  as  a 
boy  charged  with  sophomorical  sentiment,  casting 
about  to  find  what  inspiration  I  ought  to  borrow 
from  nature ;  and  I  had  ploughed  the  field  too 
often  to  find  any  genuine  crop  on  it.  I  had  passed 
months  painting  in  the  glades,  had  wandered  and 
boated  in  the  forest  and  on  the  streams  till  I  felt 
the  points  of  the  compass  in  the  dark,  and  knew 
its  material  fact  as  I  knew  my  bedroom;  but  I 
had  come  to  look  on  it  as  one  does  on  one  of  those 
curious  shells  which  some  insects  cast,  and  which 
keep  the  form  from  which  the  life  has  escaped. 
It  was  to  me  empty;  it  no  longer  lured  me  with 

*  This  is  a  singularly  faithful  expression  of  the  appearance  of  the 
massive  foliage  of  those  lofty  trees  lighted  by  the  camp-fires  beneath. 

t  The  decayed  tree-trunks,  falling  into  ruin,  often  looked  like 
glow-worms  in  the  dark  of  night,  their  phosphorescence  being  fre 
quently  brilliant. 


276  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

any  emotion  beyond  that  of  quiet,  the  charm  of 
Lethe,  the  fascination  of  an  almost  complete 
negation  of  intellectual  existence,  and  absolute 
rest.  I  was  therefore  profoundly  interested  in 
Emerson's  first  impressions,  arid  we  were  much 
together.  I  rowed  him  into  the  innermost  re 
cesses  of  Follansbee  Water,  and  would,  at  his 
request,  sometimes  land  him  in  a  solitary  part 
of  the  lake-shore,  and  leave  him  to  his  emotions 
or  studies.  We  had  no  post,  and  letters  neither 
came  nor  went,  and  so,  probably,  none  record  the 
moment's  mood;  but  well  I  remember  how  he 
marvelled  at  the  completeness  of  the  circle  of 
life  in  the  forest.  He  examined  the  guides, 
and  me  as  one  of  them,  with  the  interest  of  a 
discoverer  of  a  new  race.  Me  he  had  known 
in  another  phase  of  existence  —  at  the  club,  in 
the  multitude,  one  of  the  atoms  of  the  social 
whole.  To  find  me  axe  in  hand,  ready  for  the 
elementary  functions  of  a  savage  life — to  fell  the 
trees,  to  kill  the  deer,  or  catch  the  trout,  and  at 
need  to  cook  them  —  in  this  to  him  new  phe 
nomenon  of  a  rounded  and  self-sufficient  individu 
ality,  waiting  for,  and  waited  on,  by  no  one,  he 
received  a  conception  of  life  which  had  the  same 
attraction  in  its  completeness  and  roundness  that 
a  larger  and  fully  organised  existence  would  have 
had.  It  was  a  form  of  independence  which  he 
had  never  realised  before,  and  he  paid  it  the 
respect  of  a  new  discovery.  He  had  become  weary 
of  the  social  completeness  as  a  study,  it  seemed 
to  me;  it  was  too  large  and  exacting.  But  now 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  277 

he  found  a  man  who  could  be  taken  up  as  a 
specimen,  and  studied  as  an  individual,  as  Agassiz 
would  have  studied  a  fossil;  and  all  this  was 
new. 

Emerson,  as  I  read  him,  had  no  self-sufficiency. 
He  lived  and  felt  with  the  minimum  of  personal 
colour,  reflecting  nature  and  man;  and  the  study 
of  the  guide,  the  savage  man  thrown  out  of 
society  like  a  chip  from  a  log  under  the  axe  of 
the  chopper,  returning  to  the  status  of  pure  in 
dividuality  —  men  such  as  our  guides  were  — 
aroused  in  the  philosopher  the  enthusiasm  of  a 
new  fact.  He  often  spoke  of  it,  and  watched  the 
men  as  a  naturalist  does  the  animals  he  classifies. 
I  remember  Longfellow's  once  saying  of  Emerson 
that  he  used  his  friends  as  one  did  lemons — when 
he  could  squeeze  nothing  more  from  them,  he 
threw  them  away;  but  this,  while  in  one  sense 
true,  does  Emerson  a  radical  injustice.  He  had  no 
vanity,  no  self-importance;  truth  and  philosophy 
were  so  supreme  in  their  hold  on  him  that  neither 
his  self  nor  any  other  self  was  worth  so  much  as 
the  solution  of  a  problem  in  life.  To  get  this 
solution  he  was  willing  to  squeeze  himself  like  a 
lemon,  if  need  were ;  and  why  should  he  be  other 
wise  disposed  to  his  neighbour  ?  There  are  others 
who  knew  Emerson  better  than  I  did  or  could, 
and  possibly  Longfellow  did,  though  that  obser 
vation  makes  me  doubt  that  there  was  any  real 
sympathy  between  them.  But  what  seems  to  me 
the  truth  is,  that  Emerson  instinctively  divided 
men  into  two  classes,  with  one  of  which  he  formed 


278  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

personal  attachments  which,  though  tranquil  and 
undemonstrative,  as  was  his  nature,  were  lasting ; 
in  the  other  he  simply  found  his  objects  of  study, 
problems  to  be  solved  and  their  solutions  recorded. 
There  was  the  least  conceivable  self-assertion  in 
him;  he  was  the  best  listener  a  genuine  thinker, 
or  one  whom  he  thought  to  be  such,  ever  had; 
and  always  seemed  to  prefer  to  listen  rather 
than  to  talk,  to  observe  and  study  rather  than 
to  discourse.  So  he  did  not  say  much  before 
nature;  he  took  in  her  influences  as  the  earth 
takes  the  rain.  He  was  minutely  interested  in 
seeing  how  the  old  guides  reversed  the  tendencies 
of  civilisation:  how  when  they  went  to  sleep  on 
the  ground  they  put  on  their  coats,  but  took 
them  off  when  they  got  up;  wore  their  hats  in 
camp,  but  went  on  the  lake  bareheaded. 

The  entire  absorption  of  his  personality  in  the 
subject-matter  of  study  was  childlike ;  he  left  no 
cranny  of  novelty  unsearched.  I  remember  that 
one  Sunday  morning,  when  the  state  of  the  larder 
made  it  necessary  for  the  guides  to  get  a  deer, 
Emerson  was  more  disposed  for  quiet  meditation, 
having  at  that  time  no  interest  in  the  hunt ;  so 
I  took  him  in  my  boat,  and  while  those  of  the 
company  whose  habits  did  not  interfere  with  the 
enjoyment  of  the  chase  on  Sunday  went  to  the 
watching-posts  with  the  guides,  we  sought  the 
remotest  nook  of  the  lake-shore.  It  was  a 
magnificent  morning,  and  in  the  silence  of  the 
forest  the  baying  of  the  hounds,  as  they  took 
the  scent  on  the  hills  above  us  and  followed 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  279 

the  deer  in  his  doublings  and  evasions,  filled  the 
air,  and  the  echoes  redoubled  the  music.  When 
the  deer  are  in  good  condition,  as  in  August,  they 
generally  take  a  long  run  before  they  come  to 
water,  and  we  heard  the  dogs  sweeping  round 
over  the  hills  at  the  farther  end  of  the  lake,  and 
coming  back,  ranging  to  and  fro,  till  the  expect 
ancy  and  the  new  sensation  grew  in  effect  on 
Emerson,  and  he  could  resist  no  longer.  "Let 
us  go  after  the  deer ! "  he  exclaimed ;  and  though, 
having  come  out  for  meditation,  we  had  no  gun 
with  us,  we  were  soon  flying  down  the  lake  from 
our  remotest  corner  to  where  the  baying  led  to 
the  shore.  But  we  were  too  late;  Lowell  had 
already  killed  the  deer  before  we  got  there. 

It  was  interesting  to  see  how  Emerson  grew 
into  the  camp  life.  As  at  first  he  had  refused  to 
carry  a  rifle,  and  decided  to  take  one  only  for 
uniformity,  so,  in  the  early  days  of  our  forest 
residence,  he  declined  to  take  any  part  in  the 
hunting  or  fishing;  but  we  had  not  been  long 
in  camp  before  he  caught  the  temper  of  the 
occasion,  and  began  to  desire  to  kill  his  deer. 
Luck  failed  him  in  the  drives  in  which  he  took 
part,  the  deer  always  coming  in  to  some  other 
watcher,  and  we  decided  to  try  night-hunting— 
i.e.,  stealing  up  to  the  deer  as  they  browse  in 
the  pads  along  the  shallow  water,  carrying  in 
the  bow  of  the  boat  a  light  which  blinds  the 
animal,  the  lantern  throwing  all  its  light  for 
ward,  and  the  hunter  sitting  invisible  in  the 
shadow.  This  manner  of  hunting  is  possible  only 


280  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

on  very  dark  nights,  and  was  resorted  to  only 
when  venison  was  needed  and  the  drive  had 
failed.  If  the  man  who  paddles  the  boat  is 
dexterous,  the  deer  can  be  approached  to  within 
a  few  yards  without  being  alarmed;  but  in  the 
darkness  it  is  very  difficult  for  those  not  accus 
tomed  to  the  appearance  of  the  animal  to  dis 
tinguish  him  from  the  rocks  or  shrubs  around, 
for  in  the  intent  examination  of  the  strange 
phenomenon  of  the  light  he  remains  motionless, 
except  that  now  and  then  he  will  beat  the  water 
with  his  hoofs  to  drive  away  the  flies.  We  took 
the  best  guide  at  the  paddle,  Emerson  taking  the 
firing-seat  behind  the  lamp,  and  I  in  the  middle 
with  my  rifle  ready,  in  case  he  missed  his  shot. 

We  went  down  the  lake  to  the  large  bay  at 
the  left  of  the  outlet,  now  noted  on  the  map  of 
the  State  survey  as  "Agassiz  Bay,"  which  is  a 
mistake,  for  we  named  this  "Osprey  Bay,"  from 
the  osprey  nest  in  one  of  its  tall  pines,  the  bay 
opposite  the  camp  at  the  south  end  of  the  lake 
being  named  in  honour  of  Agassiz.  The  shore 
is  an  alternation  of  stretches  of  sandy  beach 
where  the  white  pond  -  lily  thrives,  and  off ers 
food  for  the  deer,  and  rocky  points  separate  the 
beaches  as  if  by  screens,  so  that  any  movement 
in  one  of  the  little  bays  is  not  visible  in  another. 
There  is  something  weird  in  silently  gliding  along 
a  spectral  diorama  of  irrecognisable  landscape, 
with  rocks  and  trees  slipping  by  like  phantasms; 
for  the  motion  of  the  boat  is  not  distinguishable, 
and  the  only  sound  is  the  occasional  grating  of 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  281 

the  rushes  on  the  bottom  of  the  boat.  It  is,  in 
fact,  the  most  exciting  form  of  deer-hunting  for 
certain  temperaments,  and  the  poet  was  strongly 
impressed.  The  practised  ear  of  the  guide  soon 
caught  the  sound  of  the  footfall  of  a  deer  mak 
ing  his  way  down  to  the  shore,  and  he  turned 
the  glare  of  the  lamp  on  the  beach,  moving 
directly  on  him  till  he  was  within  twenty  yards. 
The  signal  to  fire  was  given  and  repeated,  but 
Emerson  could  distinguish  nothing.  "Shoot!" 
finally  whispered  the  guide  in  the  faintest  breath. 
"  Shoot ! "  I  repeated  nearer.  But  the  deer  was 
invisible  to  him,  and  we  drifted  to  a  boat's  length 
from  him  before  the  animal  took  fright  and 
bolted  for  the  woods,  undisturbed  by  a  hasty 
shot  I  sent  after  him,  and  we  heard  his  triumph 
ant  whistle  and  gallop  dying  away  in  the  forest 
depths.  Emerson  was  stupefied.  We  rounded 
the  next  point,  and  found  a  deer  already  on  the 
feeding  -  ground,  to  repeat  the  experience.  The 
deer  stood  broadside  to  him,  in  full  view,  in 
the  shallow  water;  but,  straining  his  vision  to 
the  utmost,  he  could  distinguish  nothing  like  a 
deer,  and  when  we  had  got  so  near  that  the 
same  result  was  imminent,  I  fired,  and  the  buck 
fell  dead.  "Well,"  said  Emerson,  "if  that  was 
a  deer,  I  shall  fire  at  the  first  square  thing  I 
see";  but  we  saw  no  more  that  night.  He 
records  the  impression: 

"  Or,  later  yet,  beneath  a  lighted  jack, 
In  the  boat's  bows,  a  silent  night-hunter 


282  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

Stealing  with  paddle  to  the  feeding-grounds 
Of  the  red  deer,  to  aim  at  a  square  mist. 
Hark  to  that  muffled  roar  !    A  tree  in  the  woods 
Is  fallen :  but  hush  !   it  has  not  scared  the  buck, 
Who  stands  astonished  at  the  meteor  light, 
Then  turns  to  bound  away, — is  it  too  late?" 

Each  disappointment,  however,  plunged  him  more 
deeply  into  the  excitement  of  the  chase,  and  he 
was  most  anxious  to  kill  his  deer  before  he  went 
home,  unable  to  resist  the  contagion  of  the  passion 
for  it.  He  said  to  me  one  day,  "  I  must  kill  a  deer 
before  we  go  home,  even  if  the  guide  has  to 
hold  him  by  the  tail."  At  that  season  of  the  year, 
when  the  deer  are  in  their  "  short  coat,"  the  body 
sinks  at  once  if  shot  in  the  deep  water;  and  on 
overtaking  the  quarry  in  the  lake,  if  the  deer-slayer 
was  not  sure  of  his  shot,  the  guide  used  to  run 
the  boat  alongside  of  it,  and  catch  it  by  the  tail, 
when  the  shot  became  a  sure  one.  As  we  hunted 
only  when  we  needed  the  meat,  we  did  not  risk 
the  loss  of  the  deer,  and  when  a  poor  shot  held 
the  gun,  the  quarry  was  caught  by  the  tail  and 
killed  in  this  unsportsmanlike  way.  That  survival 
of  the  earliest  passion  of  the  primitive  man,  the 
passion  of  the  chase,  overcame  even  the  philo 
sophic  mind  of  Emerson,  once  exposed  to  the 
original  influences,  and  he  recognised  his  ancestral 
bent.  Few  of  us  who  live  an  active  life  fail  to 
be  attracted  by  this  first  of  all  occupations  of 
the  yet  uncivilised  man.  Emerson  never  had  the 
gratification  of  his  desire;  the  deer  never  came 
to  him  on  the  drive,  and  his  repetition  of  the 
night-hunt  was  no  more  successful. 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  283 

The  starry  magnificence  of  those  nights,  with 
their  pure  mountain  air,  was  another  source  of 
delight  hardly  to  be  imagined  by  those  who  have 
not  known  it  by  experience.  There  seemed  to  be 
more  stars  visible  than  anywhere  else  I  had  ever 
been,  and  we  were  often  out  on  the  lake  till  near 
midnight ; 

"Or,  in  the  evening  twilight's  latest  red, 
Beholding  the  procession  of  the  pines," — 

a  curious  phenomenon,  now,  with  the  ravages  of 
fire  and  axe,  become  a  thing  of  the  past.  The 
tall  white  pines,  which  when  full  grown  rise  from 
one  hundred  and  fifty  to  two  hundred  feet, 
towering  nearly  half  their  height  above  the  mass 
of  deciduous  trees,  and  beyond  the  protection 
which  the  solid  forest  gives  against  the  dominant 
west  winds,  acquire  a  leaning  to  the  east;  and  as 
they  grew  in  long  lines  along  the  shores,  or 
followed  the  rocky  ridges  up  the  mountain  sides, 
they  seemed  to  be  gigantic  human  beings  moving 
in  procession  to  the  east.  I  had  the  year  before 
painted  a  picture  of  the  subject,  and  Emerson  had 
been  struck  by  it  at  the  AthenEeum  exhibition; 
and  when  we  were  established  in  camp,  almost 
the  first  thing  he  asked  to  see  was  the  "  procession 
of  the  pines";  and  our  last  evening  on  the  lake 
was  spent  together  watching  the  glow  dying  out 
behind  a  noble  line  of  the  marching  pines  on  the 
shore  of  Follansbee  Water. 

In  memory  of  that  summer,  and  the  intimacy 
of  camp  life  which  strips  the  man  of  all  dis 
guises,  Emerson  seems  to  me  to  be  magnified 


284  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

with  the  lapse  of  time,  as  Mont  Blanc  towers 
above  his  fellows  with  distance.  For  Lowell,  I 
had  a  passionate  personal  attachment  to  which 
death  and  time  have  only  given  a  twilight  glory; 
for  Agassiz,  I  had  the  feeling  which  all  had  who 
came  under  the  magic  of  his  colossal  individu 
ality — the  myriad-minded  one  to  whom  nothing 
came  amiss  or  unfamiliar,  and  who  had  a  facet 
for  every  man  he  came  in  contact  with.  His 
inexhaustible  bonhomie  won  even  the  guides  to 
a  personal  fealty  they  showed  no  other  of  our 
band;  his  wide  science  gave  us  continual  lectures 
on  all  the  elements  of  nature  —  no  plant,  no 
insect,  no  quadruped  hiding  its  secret  from  him. 
The  lessons  he  taught  us  of  the  leaves  of  the 
pine,  and  of  the  vicissitudes  of  the  Laurentian 
range,  in  one  of  whose  hollows  we  lay;  the 
way  he  drew  new  facts  from  the  lake,  and  knew 
them  when  he  saw  them,  as  though  he  had  set 
his  seal  on  them  before  they  were  known ;  the 
daily  dissection  of  the  fish,  the  deer,  the  mice 
(for  which  he  had  brought  his  traps),  were 
studies  in  which  we  were  his  assistants  and 
pupils.  All  this  made  being  with  him  not  only 
"a  liberal  education,"  but  perpetual  sunshine  and 
good  fortune.  When  we  went  out,  I  at  the 
oars  and  he  at  the  dredge  or  insect-net,  or 
examining  the  plants  by  the  marsh-side,  his  spirit 
was  a  perpetual  spring  of  science.  When  he  and 
Wyman  entered  on  the  discussion  of  a  scientific 
subject  (and  they  always  worked  together), 
science  seemed  as  easy  as  versification  when 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  285 

Lowell  was  in  the  mood,  and  all  sat  around 
inhaling  wisdom  with  the  mountain  air.  Nothing 
could  have  been,  to  any  man  with  the  scientific 
bent,  more  intensely  interesting  than  the  academy 
of  two  of  the  greatest  scientists  of  their  day. 
Wyman's  was  a  gentle,  womanlike  nature,  modest 
to  a  fault,  utterly  absorbed  in  his  science,  and 
free  from  a  shadow  of  pretension.  He  was 
held  by  many  to  be  the  greater  scientist,  but 
the  personality  of  Agassiz  towered  over  every 
other  about  him,  and  won  all  suffrages  for  the 
day.  But  looking  back  across  the  gulf  which 
hides  all  the  details  of  life,  the  eternal  absence 
which  forgets  personal  qualities,  the  calm,  platonic 
serenity  of  Emerson  stands  out  from  all  our 
company  as  a  crystallisation  of  impersonal  and 
universal  humanity;  no  vexation,  no  mishap 
could  disturb  his  philosophy,  or  rob  him  of  its 
lesson. 

At  our  dinners,  the  semblance  of  which  life  will 
never  offer  me  again,  the  gods  sent  their  best 
accompaniments  and  influences — health,  appetite, 
wit,  and  poetry,  with  good  digestion. 

"Our  foaming  ale  we  drank  from  hunters'  pans- 
Ale,  and  a  sup  of  wine.     Our  steward  gave 
Venison  and  trout,  potatoes,  beans,  wheat-bread. 
All  ate  like  abbots,  and,  if  any  missed 
Their  wonted  convenience,  cheerly  hid  the  loss 
With  hunter's  appetite  and  peals  of  mirth." 

Lowell  was  the  Magnus  Apollo  of  the  camp. 
His  Castalian  humour,  his  unceasing  play  of  wit 
and  erudition— poetry  and  the  best  of  the  poets 


286  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

always  on  tap  at  the  table — all  know  them  who 
knew  him  well,  though  not  many  as  I  did;  but 
when  he  sat  on  one  side  of  the  table,  and  Judge 
Hoar  (the  most  pyrotechnical  wit  I  have  ever 
known)  and  he  were  matching  table-talk,  with 
Emerson  and  Agassiz  to  sit  as  umpires  and 
revive  the  vein  as  it  menaced  to  flag,  Holmes 
and  Estes  Howe  not  silent  in  the  well-matched 
contest,  the  forest  echoed  with  such  laughter  as 
no  club  ever  knew,  and  the  owls  came  in  the 
trees  overhead  to  wonder.  These  were  symposia 
to  which  fortune  has  invited  few  men,  and 
which  no  one  invited  could  ever  forget. 

The  magical  quality  of  the  forest  is  that  of 
oblivion  of  all  that  is  left  in  the  busy  world — 
of  past  trouble  and  coming  care.  The  steeds 
that  brought  us  in  had  no  place  behind  for  black 
care.  We  lived,  as  Emerson  says, 

"  Lords  of  this  realm, 

Bounded  by  dawn  and  sunset,  and  the  day 
Rounded  by  hours  where  each  outdid  the  last 
In  miracles  of  pomp,  we  must  be  proud, 
As  if  associates  of  the  sylvan  gods. 
We  seemed  the  dwellers  of  the  zodiac, 
So  pure  the  Alpine  element  we  breathed, 
So  light,  so  lofty  pictures  came  and  went." 

At  sunrise,  the  guides  and  we  who  had  cares 
of  the  camp  were  afoot ;  fires  were  refreshed, 
bathers  went  out,  and  a  boat  went  to  look  at 
the  set  lines  for  trout.  Breakfast  was  at  eight. 
Then  we  practised  firing  at  a  mark,  a  few  rounds 
each,  the  scientists  dissected  their  specimens,  and 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  287 

the  guides  did  the  "  house-work."  I  made  a  study 
as  the  memorial  of  the  event — the  morning  hour 
in  the  camp :  Agassiz  and  Wyman  on  one  side 
dissecting  a  trout,  with  the  assistance  of  Howe 
and  Holmes;  on  the  other,  the  firing  party, 
Lowell,  Judge  Hoar,  and  the  rest  of  us,  except 
Emerson,  who  professed  to  be  neither  rifleman 
nor  anatomist,  but  with  a  pilgrim's  staff  in  hand 
took  a  place  alone  and  between  the  two  groups, 
with  an  intentional  symbolism  of  his  position  in 
the  world.  Then,  if  venison  was  wanted,  we  set 
the  hunt;  or  those  who  chose  to  wander  did  so, 
explored  the  streams  and  woods  around,  botan- 
ised,  hunted  specimens,  or  fished. 

"Ask  you,  how  went  the  hours? 
All  day  we  swept  the  lake,  searched  every  cove, 
North  from  Camp  Maple,  south  to  Osprey  Bay, 
Watching  when  the  loud  dogs  should  drive  in  deer, 
Or  whipping  its  rough  surface  for  a  trout ; 
Or,  bathers,  diving  from  the  rock  at  noon ; 
Challenging  Echo  by  our  guns  and  cries ; 
Or  listening  to  the  laughter  of  the  loon. 

Our  heroes  tried  their  rifles  at  a  mark, 
Six  rods,  sixteen,  twenty,  or  forty-five; 
Sometimes  their  wits  at  sally  and  retort, 
With  laughter  sudden  as  the  crack  of  rifle ; 
Or  parties  scaled  the  near  acclivities, 
Competing  seekers  of  a  rumoured  lake, 
Whose  unauthenticated  waves  we  named 
Lake  Probability,— our  carbuncle, 
Long  sought,  not  found. 

Two  doctors  in  the  camp 

Dissected  the  slain  deer,  weighed  the  trout's  brain, 
Captured  the  lizard,  salamander,  shrew, 


288  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

Crab,  mice,  snail,  dragon-fly,  minnow,  and  moth  ; 

Insatiate  skill  in  water  or  in  air 

Waved  the  scoop-net,  and  nothing  came  amiss  ; 

The  while,  one  leaden  pot  of  alcohol 

Gave  an  impartial  tomb  to  all  the  kinds. 

Not  less  the  ambitious  botanist  sought  plants — 

Orchis  and  gentian,  fern  and  long  whip-scirpus, 

Rosy  polygonum,  lake-margin's  pride, 

Hypnum  and  hydnum,  mushroom,  sponge,  and  moss, 

Or  harebell  nodding  in  the  gorge  of  falls." 

A  pleasant  life  it  was;  there  was  no  prevention 
of  debtor  or  creditor,  no  due-bills  or  trouble  of 
business;  all  had  put  affairs  by  for  a  certain 
time,  and  day  by  day  the  Lethean  silence  lured 
us  deeper  into  its  magic  recesses.  The  outside 
world  was  but  a  dream.  No  visitor  intruded  on 
our  presence.  We  ate  a  deer  every  day,  and 
the  venison  was  such  as  no  king  ever  tasted, 
and  our  lake  furnished  trout  in  perfection.  The 
larder  was  always  provided:  not  often  was  the 
drive  without  its  deer,  and  if  by  chance  two 
were  killed  in  one  day,  we  killed  none  the  next, 
for  we  tolerated  no  waste  or  wanton  killing, 
and  the  osprey,  the  eagle,  and  the  loon  had  in 
us  friends.  The  effect  of  this  life  alike  on  the 
physical  and  mental  condition  was  such  as  only 
experience  can  estimate.  It  was  wonderful  to  see 
how  the  healing  of  the  mighty  mother  cured  the 
ailments  we  brought  with  us.  It  was  nothing  new 
to  me,  but  to  the  newcomers  it  was  like  enchant 
ment.  Agassiz  came  suffering  from  rheumatism 
and  overwork,  but  four  days  sufficed  to  restore 
him  to  his  normal  condition.  The  dust  that 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  289 

the  turmoil  of  civilisation  throws  into  the  mental 
mechanism  was  no  longer  allowed  to  wear  or 
weary;  life  and  all  its  problems  came  out  in  a 
much  less  complex  light,  and  the  conditions  of 
existence  seemed  simplified.  Why  should  men 
be  anxious  for  more,  when  with  little  we  fared 
so  well,  or  were  so  easily  provided?  No  com 
plication  of  this  problem  was  forced  on  the 
mind,  which  was  left  in  this  so  facile  solution 
of  it  that  it  seemed  to  clear  the  future  of  all  its 
difficulties.  We  seemed  to  have  got  back  into 
a  not  too  greatly-changed  Eden,  whose  imperious 
ties  to  the  outer  world  were  hidden  for  the  day 
in  the  waters  and  woods  that  lay  between  us 
and  it.  We  had  at  last  come  to  the  state  where 
what  each  man  was  and  had  made  of  himself 
was  the  real  measure  of  his  relation  to  the 
world,  and  the  universal  mother  took  us  all  on 
the  same  terms,  the  worst  prodigal  reckoned  as 
good  as  he  who  had  endured  guiltlessly  his 
temptation,  the  worst  violator  of  her  laws  with 
the  least  sinner. 

"  So  fast  will  Nature  acclimate  her  sons, 
Though  late  returning  to  her  pristine  ways. 
Off  soundings,  seamen  do  not  suffer  cold ; 
And  in  the  forest,  delicate  clerks,  unbrowned, 
Sleep  on  the  fragrant  brush,  as  on  down-beds. 
Up  with  the  dawn,  they  fancied  the  light  air 
That  circled  freshly  in  their  forest  dress 
Made  them  to  boys  again.     Happier  that  they 
Slipped  off  their  pack  of  duties,  leagues  behind, 
At  the  first  mounting  of  the  giant  stairs. 
No  placard  on  these  rocks  warned  to  the  polls, 
No  door-bell  heralded  a  visitor, 
T 


290  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

No  courier  waits,  no  letter  came  or  went, 

Nothing  was  ploughed,  or  reaped,  or  bought,  or  sold. 

The  frost  might  glitter,  it  would  blight  no  crop ; 

The  falling  rain  would  spoil  no  holiday. 

We  were  made  freemen  of  the  forest  laws, 

All  dressed,  like  nature,  fit  for  her  own  ends, 

Essaying  nothing  she  cannot  perform." 


I    have    quoted    enough    to    show    how    fully 
Emerson    caught,    in    his    first     experience,    the 
spirit  of   the  woods:    not  morbidly,  like  Shelley, 
nor  with  the  air  of  calling  all  the  world  to  see 
how  solitary  he  was,  which  seems  to  me  so  much 
to  impair  the  genuineness  of  Thoreau's  experience 
in  the    barn-door  backwoods    in  which  he    acted 
the  recluse.     Thoreau  was  a  modern  realist  with 
a   morose    and    uncompanionable    genius    always 
in  attendance;  his  was  a  pinchbeck  royalty  with 
a  lunch -basket    from    his    father's    farm    hardly 
hidden  behind  his  throne.    He  saw  minutely,  as 
all  short-sighted  people  do ;  Emerson,  in  his  single 
interview  with  a  true  and  uncontaminated  nature, 
saw  all  the  relations  between  her  and  not  merely 
one     individuality,     narrow     or     large,     but     all 
humanity.    The  ancient  Greek  in  him  found  the 
algebraic  formula  of  existence,  the  absolute  ideal 
of   man  and   the  law  of  his  relation    to  nature. 
He    saw  "hypnum  and  hydnum,"  but    put    them 
down    as    details    in   a   foreground.     What    filled 
his    canvas    was    manhood.      He    measured    and 
specialised  nature  with  reference  to  a  completed 
and  ideal  type  in  which  nature  was  fulfilled,  and 
he  bowed  to  the  backwoodsman. 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  291 

"  Your  rank  is  all  reversed.     Let  men  of  cloth 
Bow  to  the  stalwart  churls  in  overalls : 
They  are  the  doctors  of  the  wilderness, 
And  we  the  low-prized  laymen." 

If  the  experience  was  unique,  it  was  sufficient, 
and  other  summers  had  been  only  repetitions; 
his  epic  of  the  wilderness  may  be  made  more 
picturesque  by  another  telling,  but  not  more  com 
plete.  What  he  did  in  this  poem  is  unique  as 
was  the  occasion.  He  reduced  man  to  his  most 
simple  condition  before  nature  in  her  most 
primitive  state  and  drew  them  as  a  whole,  as  the 
great  painters  did  their  outdoor  figure-subjects 
— humanity  always  the  keynote  of  the  picture. 
When  he  has  told  nature's  message,  he  gives  by 
implication  something  beyond  the  interpretation 
of  it  as  rendered  in  thought,  the  recognition  of 
what  it  does  with  humanity.  Taking  man  in  the 
simple  and  complete  type,  to  which  he  does  full 
honour,  as  he  reverences  nature;  beyond  this 
and  that  there  stands  always  the  higher  and 
ultimate  universal  nature  of  which  man  is  a  part, 
but  the  crowning  part,  the  aspiring  and  suffer 
ing  humanity.  There  is  no  conflict;  only,  when 
all  has  been  said  for  the  backwoods  and  the 
backwoodsman,  he  points  to  another  humanity 
and  nature  beyond. 

"  And  presently  the  sky  is  changed;  0  world! 
What  pictures  and  what  harmonies  are  thine ! 
The  clouds  are  rich  and  dark,  the  air  serene, 
So  like  the  soul  of  me,  what  if  'twere  me  ? 
A  melancholy  better  than  all  mirth. 


292  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

Comes  the  sweet  sadness  at  the  retrospect, 
Or  at  the  foresight  of  obscurer  years? 

And,  that  no  day  of  life  may  lack  romance, 
The  spiritual  stars  rise  nightly,  shedding  down 
A  private  beam  into  each  several  heart. 

Suns  haste  to  set,  that  so  remoter  lights 
Beckon  the  wanderer  to  his  vaster  home." 

In  the  midst  of  this  hymn  to  nature,  it  was 
one  of  the  supreme  achievements  of  the  me 
chanical  mind  of  man  which  furnished  the  text 
for  his  loudest  paean.  Some  of  the  members  of 
the  company,  in  their  wanderings  outside  our 
realm,  had  met  a  traveller  with  the  news  of  the 
laying  of  the  first  transatlantic  cable,  and  came 
back  to  camp  with  the  great  news. 

"  One  held  a  printed  journal,  waving  high, 
Caught  from  a  late-arriving  traveller, 
Big  with  great  news,  and  shouted  the  report 
For  which  the  world  had  waited,  now  firm  fact, 
Of  the  wire-cable  laid  beneath  the  sea, 
And  landed  on  our  coast,  and  pulsating 
With  ductile  fire.     Loud,  exulting  cries 
From  boat  to  boat,  and  to  the  echoes  round, 
Greet  the  glad  miracle." 

Emerson  is,  we  say,  cold.  Perhaps  in  the  day 
when  only  bacchanals  heat  the  public  ear  he  may 
be  so.  There  is  no  passion  which  the  public  now 
generally  recognise  as  such,  except  the  personal; 
but  in  that  serener  sphere  where  Plato  breathed, 
the  nature  of  Emerson  is  too  much  at  home  to 
be  yet  widely  understood  in  its  passion.  How 
Greek  is  this  passionate  outburst  at  the  new 
revolt  of  the  human  mind  against  its  limitations, 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  293 

this  clapping  of  hands  at  the  Promethean  un 
loosing!  And  Promethean  passion  was  his:  it 
quickened  his  blood  with  every  human  footstep 
upward,  it  kindled  the  light  of  his  calm  eyes 
anew  with  every  indignity  offered  humanity ;  not 
only  the  slavery  of  the  black  and  the  barbarian 
made  his  anger  burn,  but  the  slavery  of  civilisa 
tion  and  self-imposed  wrong  made  his  soul  heavy. 
And  people  have  the  idea  of  comparing  him 
with  the  burly  Carlyle!  As  well  Apollo  with  a 
jotun!  "Deficient  in  form  and  polish?"  Well, 
the  ages  had  not  yet  furnished  the  material  to 
cut  this  diamond  to  its  faceted  formality;  there 
is  neither  the  form  of  Sophocles  nor  the  fluency 
of  Plato,  but  it  was  further  from  Homer  to 
Plato  than  from  Chaucer  to  Emerson.  Then  see 
the  Greek  again  in  his  instinctive  impersonation 
of  the  forces  of  nature — "Chronos  and  Tellus 
who  were  before  Jove": 

"  A  spasm  throbbing  through  the  pedestals 
Of  Alp  and  Andes,  isle  and  continent, 
Urging  astonished  Chaos  with  a  thrill 
To  be  a  brain,  or  serve  the  brain  of  man. 
The  lightning  has  run  masterless  too  long ; 
He  must  to  school  and  learn  his  verb  and  noun, 
And  teach  his  nimbleness  to  earn  his  wage, 
Spelling  with  guided  tongue  man's  messages 
Shot  through  the  weltering  pit  of  the  salt  sea." 

But  our  paradise  was  no  Eden.  The  world 
that  played  bo-peep  with  us  across  the  moun 
tains  came  for  us  when  the  play-spell  was  over; 
this  summer  dream,  unique  in  the  record  of 
poesy,  melted  like  a  cloud-castle  into  its  original 


294  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

elements,  and  Emerson  was  one  of  the  first  to 
turn  back  to  the  sterner  use  of  time. 

"  The  holidays  were  fruitful,  but  must  end ; 
One  August  evening  had  a  cooler  breath; 
Into  each  mind  intruding  duties  crept ; 
Under  the  cinders  burned  the  fires  of  home ; 
Nay,  letters  found  us  in  our  paradise : 
So  in  the  gladness  of  the  new  event 
We  struck  our  camp  and  left  the  happy  hills." 

The  lake  became  for  a  time  a  place  of  pilgrim 
age.  To  visit  the  Philosophers'  Camp  was  one  of 
the  items  of  an  Adirondack  trip. 

"  We  planned 

That  we  should  build,  hard  by,  a  spacious  lodge, 
And  how  we  should  come  hither  with  our  sons 
Hereafter." 

And  the  permanent  meeting-place  was  fixed  at 
Ampersand  Pond,  to  which  in  time  the  traditior 
of  the  Philosophers'  Camp  was  attached,  and 
where,  as  long  as  the  club  existed,  the  annual 
meetings  were  held. 

Twenty-five  years  elapsed  before  I  returned  to 
Follansbee  Water.  The  genius  loci,  dryad  or 
hamadryad,  had  there  been  one,  would  have 
found  it  as  hard  to  recognise  me  as  I  found  it 
hard  to  find  Camp  Maple.  I  had  the  same  guide, 
Steve  Martin,  a  grey-headed  man,  the  worse  for 
a  life  of  hardship,  which,  I  find,  does  not  always 
harden;  but  we  found  with  great  difficulty  the 
landing  and  the  choked-up  spring.  A  half-re 
forested  clearing  spread  round  the  spot  where 
our  "ten  scholars"  used  to  lie,  and  a  tangle.d 


THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP  295 

thicket  of  raspberry  bushes,  lady's-willow,  birch 
saplings,  and  tall  grass,  made  walking  almost 
impossible.  We  found  a  huge  rock  that  had 
been  a  landmark,  but  this  and  the  spring  alone 
were  to  be  distinguished.  The  careless  sports 
men  had  cut  all  the  hard  wood  away,  and  let  the 
fires  in,  and  the  whole  forest  round  had  been 
burned,  and  was  succeeded  by  thickets  of  under 
growth.  The  great  maples  and  the  tall  white 
pines  had  gone  from  the  entire  vicinity,  and  a 
vulgar  new  forest  was  on  its  way;  the  trees  that 
used  to  line  the  lake-shore  had  fallen  into  the 
lake,  their  roots  being  burned  away;  and  not  the 
slightest  feature  remained  of  the  grove  where 
wit  and  wisdom  held  tournament  a  generation 
before.  All  was  ashes  and  ruin.  I 

"  felt  like  one  who  treads  alone 
Some  banquet-hall  deserted." 

Nor  was  the  lake  less  changed  in  outward  ap 
pearance.  Every  fit  camping-ground  on  the  shore 
had  been  occupied  in  succession,  and  the  camp- 
fires  allowed  to  spread  into  the  forest  until  the 
whole  shore  had  been  denuded  of  its  fringe  of 
hoary  trees.  The  "procession  of  the  pines"  had 
gone  by  for  ever;  only  here  and  there  a  dead 
trunk  was  standing,  among  them  that  up  which 
Lowell's  guide  climbed  to  the  osprey's  nest  to  get 
an  egg  for  Agassiz.  Speculating  manufacturers 
had  built  a  dam  across  the  Kaquette  and  flooded 
all  the  bottom-land,  killing  the  trees  over  a  large 
tract;  wretched  dolts  had  put  pike  into  the 


296  THE  PHILOSOPHERS'  CAMP 

Raquette  waters,  and  the  trout  had  become 
exterminated  in  every  stream  to  which  the 
ravenous  fish  had  access. 

It  was  well  that  the  charm  once  broken,  the 
desecration  begun,  it  should  be  complete.  The 
memories  sacred  to  the  few  survivors  can  never 
be  quickened  by  this  ruin,  and  to  the  rest  of 
the  world  it  does  not  matter.  Emerson  has 
embalmed  it;  that  is  enough.  In  some  Eastern 
countries  it  is  the  custom  to  break  the  bowl 
from  which  an  honoured  guest  has  drunk ;  nature 
has  done  this  service  to  Follansbee  Water. 


W.   H.   WHITE  AND  CO.   LTD.,    RIVERSIDE   PRESS,   EDINBURGH. 


L  006  213  062  0 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


AA    001  219552   5 

UCLA-Young  Research  Library 

PS2919  .S8o 

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009  603  642  1 


